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Digitized by the Internet Archive 
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http://www.archive.org/details/ruralschoolarchiOOclar 



/*■ 
CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION 



BUREAU OF EDUCATION. 



No. 4-1880. 




RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE, 

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS. 



WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT FEINTING OJFJEXOE. 
18S0. 



237-238 



ft. 

— ■>. 

CONTENTS. 

Letter of the Commissioner of Education to the Secretary of the Interior 5 

Site (Figs. 1 and 2) 7 

Aspect and lighting 15 

Surroundings (Figs. 3 toll) 20 

Arrangement (Figs. 12 to 15) 26 

, Construction (Figs. 16 to 60) 39 

Ventilation (Fig. 61) 62 

Heating (Figs. 62 to 67) 70 

Sanitation (Figs. 68 to 70) 79 

Acoustics (Fig. 71) 86 

Attractiveness and economy in building (Figs. 72 to 80) '. 86 

Specifications and contracts 92 

Appendix 105 



239-240 



LETTER 



Department of the Interior, 

Bureau of Education, 
Washington, D. C, September 30, 1880. 

Sir: A concise yet complete treatise on the proper construction^ 
heating, and ventilation of school buildings has been a desideratum. 
Works of this character written in other countries have been found quite 
unsuitable here, and the same objection applies for the South and West 
to most works written in the Eastern States. The efficient ventilation 
of school buildings is also a matter not well understood by the majority 
of builders and certainly is not provided for in most buildings, now 
erected for school purposes. 

After much consideration I requested Mr. T. M. Clark, a well known 
architect of Boston, to undertake the preparation of an article which 
would be specially serviceable in the construction of school-houses in 
rural districts and in small villages in every part of tbe country, and 
which would include the latest and best information not only about the 
construction and ventilation of school buildings, but also as to their 
decoration. I transmit the result of his work. 

Mr. Clark has applied his technical and artistic knowledge as an 
architect to the conditions required by the uses to which the building is 
to be put. His paper has been carefully revised, and will, I trust, prove 
satisfactory to teachers and school committees in general. 

The aim in the paper is not so much to lay down rules to be inconsid- 
erately followed as to give principles and directions suggestive of the 
plans best to be adopted under a variety of circumstances. It has been 
thought well in this connection to add in an appendix a brief selection 
from School-Houses and Cottages for the People of the South, by C. 
Thurston Chase, respecting the construction of log school-houses. 

It is hoped that, at an early day, the Office may answer by a further 
publication some of the many inquiries in regard to buildings for high 
schools, academies, and colleges. 

I recommend the publication of Mr. Clark's paper as a circular of 
information. 

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

JOHN EATON, 

Commissioner. 

The Hon. Secretary of the Interior. 

Approved, and publication ordered. 

A. BELL, 

Acting Secretary. 
241-242 



SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



The subjects treated of in this work will be divided as follows : 

Site 5 

Aspect and Lighting ; 

Surroundings ; 

Arrangement ; 

Construction ; 

Ventilation ; 

Heating ; 

Sanitation ; 

Acoustics; 

Attractiveness and Economy in Building ; 

Specifications and Contracts. 

SITE. 

It should be unnecessary to say that whatever conditions of dryness 
of soil, sunny exposure, or remoteness from malaria or nuisances of any 
kind are desirable for a dwelling house ought to be still more earnestly 
sought in the case of school buildings, where the most sensitive and 
helpless members of the community spend the greater part of their 
waking hours under circumstances which render them j>eculiarly power- 
less to repel noxious influences if such exist. It is well known that 
persons engaged in active physical employment enjoy immunity in the 
midst of effluvia which would seriously affect them in a quiescent state, 
and children in school are especially open to the attacks of noxious 
miasms, chills, contagions, or impure air not only from their state of 
physical inaction but from the concentration of their attention upon study 
to the neglect of their bodily sensations. As the long continuance and 
daily repetition of the exposure exhaust their natural powers of resist- 
ance, it is inexcusable cruelty to them to neglect the simple precautions 
by which at least comparative salubrity may be so easily attained. 

The first essential of a suitable situation is dryness. 

Presuming the lot to be an acre in area, which may be considered 
the standard size, no permanent moisture should be found upon its sur- 
face; nor, in malarious districts, or indeed in any, is it safe to permit 
the existence of depressions in which the water collects in heavy 
rains to retreat gradually in dry weather, leaving its muddy border 
exposed to the heat of the sun. Such spots are the worst possible 

243 



8 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

breeding places of malaria. They should be drained by ditches cut 
through them iu the dry season as deep as possible, and filled with 
loose stones, or even brushwood, and the hollow should then be 
graded up considerably above the surrounding land. If there is 
much water or the soil is very compact, the drain should be carried, by 
means of pipes if convenient, to some outfall at a lower level. Grading 
alone, without drainage, is useless; the water collects just as before, 
only concealed by the loose new material. With proper drainage, the 
newly added earth, kept dry beneath, will gradually settle down to 
about three-fourths of its original bulk, and, with the help of the sod 
which will grow over the surface, the wet place will be peruianently 
cured. Iu rocky districts, a lot situated on a side hill is very apt to be 
springy, and such springs are not easily stopped. Fortunately, run- 
ning water in this form is comparatively harmless, and if all the hol- 
lows which hold the water are cleared out, so as to give the currents an 
uninterrupted descent, their vicinity may not be harmful, provided that 
no springs exist under the building itself and that the approaches to the 
school-house are so managed that no stray streamlet may cross the 
path in rainy weather to wet the children's feet; but such a lot is useless 
for a playground, and would be best avoided. In general, any dry loca- 
tion will be suitable, whether level or sloping. Even a very bleak and 
exposed spot is preferable to a sheltered one which shows signs of damp- 
ness. 

Care, however, should be taken to see that water is procurable and not 
too far off. In regions without public water supply a good well becomes 
one of the most important features of a suitable school-house lot. Every 
school should have one of these for its own exclusive use, near enough or 
rather at a suitable level with regard to the building to allow the water 
to be easily pumped in'o it. For this purpose the surface of the water 
in the well should not be more than 20 or 25 feet at the utmost below 
the first floor of the school-house, and some thought should be taken as 
to the relative location of house and well before either is decided finally. 
In many places the safest course would be to bond the land for the pro- 
posed site by a conditional agreement to purchase at a given price 
provided water were found of good quality and in sufficient quantity by 
digging a well of moderate depth in a position which should be deter- 
mined upon as being most convenient to the intended building. Then 
the well might be and should be dug at once at the point fixed upon 
as most suitable in all respects for the use of the school, and if a good 
supply of water were obtained one prime requisite for a satisfactory 
house would be certain of being fulfilled ; if not, the town would have 
spent only the cost of the trial well, which would be a very small sum, 
as little or no steining would be needed for this purpose. 

This would be far better than buying or accepting a lot blindly, trust- 
ing to fortune to decide whether the school-house to be built upon it 
' should possess that rare blessing, a good and convenient supply of pure 

244 



RURA.L SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



9 



water, or be obliged to put up with a makeshift well, perhaps dry in 
summer, very likely situated at a distance, or, if near, probably poisoned 
by the oozings of the school cesspool or of the neighbors' barnyards, or 
by some of the corruptions which are known to contaminate the well 
water used in the majority of country buildings. 

By careful observation of the ground, it is not difficult to locate with 
tolerable certainty the points where wells can be sunk with the best pros- 
pect of finding water. It should be borne in mind that the subterranean 
water from which wells are supplied moves through the ground in rivulets 
and larger streams which run along the depressions in the lower strata in 
the same way that the visible brooks and rivers do upon the surface, each 
stream draining an underground watershed of a certain extent. If a 
well is sunk anywhere on the line of one of these subterranean brooks, 
water will be found ; and the first thing to be done, in selecting a spot to 
dig, is to determine the location of such streams as may exist below the 
surface of the given lot. In alluvial soils, where "hardpan" or some 
similar stratum of earth forms the impervious layer above which the 
ground water collects, the various depressions and valleys in the hard- 
pan are generally indicated by corresponding though slight depres- 
sions in the natural surface immediately above them, and the course of 
these almost imperceptible surface hollows having been once traced, a 
well sunk on the centre line is pretty sure to reach the middle of the 
underground channel, and thus intercept whatever water may flow 
through it. 



Fig. I. 




A basin, Fig. 1, on the surface would indicate a similar hollow below, 
forming a subterranean pool, but as one of these may not exist in a good 
position relatively to the proposed building, it is generally quite as well 
to trace the course of the smaller underground brooks until one is found 
which flows conveniently near, and tap it in the most suitable place. In 
rocky districts the course of the ground waters is more difficult to folio w- 
The subterranean channel, or Thalweg, is there often not below the mid- 
245 



10 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



die line of the corresponding depression in the surface soil, but at one 
side of it or the other, according to .the inclination of the strata or the 
cleavage lines of the rocks in the locality. 

Fig. 2. p 




Thus, in Fig 2, which shows a section of such a depression, the main 
channel of the water flowing over the ledge is to be found, not under C, 
which would be the lowest part of the natural surface, but under X, 
some distance toward one side. However, an approximate estimate of 
the probable position may generally be made by judging where a line, 
P Q, drawn at the edge of the valley at the angle with the horizon 
corresponding with the general inclination of the strata, would intersect 
another line, D Q, drawn from the other boundary of the valley and 
following the general inclination of the surface of the ledge, which is 
shown by the portion which crops out, and can also, to some extent, be 
detected from the profile of the soil above it. 

In granite regions this method of ascertaining the water courses is 
complicated by the occurrence of seams, sometimes actual fissures in the 
rock, but more often small trap or greenstone dikes, in which the for- 
eign igneous rock has been broken up by natural cleavage into small 
irregular crystals, among which water flows quite freely. The gran- 
ite itself sometimes breaks up in certain directions in a manner very 
similar. These seams, however formed, usually contain water, often 
in great quantity, and, although they may extend to so great a depth 
that the water will be out of reach, it is well to trace such as may be 
detected in the outcroppings of the ledges, and to keep in mind those 
whose direction would bring them toward the position selected for the 
well. This may then be sunk near the seams, but not directly over 
them. If water is found independent of them, it is best to avoid them, 
for if they should be deep they might only serve to drain off beyond 
recovery all the water in the well as soon as the connection was made; 
but, if other sources fail, the excavation may be extended to them 
with some hope of success, especially if the vein descends from higher 
ground. 

After the positions of the subterranean collecting pools or channels 

246 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 11 

are determined with reasonable probability, care should be taken to 
trace the sources from which they gather their waters. In rocky dis- 
tricts especially, impure water flows unchanged over the surface of the 
buried ledges or through their seams for long distances, and it should 
be positively ascertained that no barnyard, graveyard, stable, sink, 
drain, vault, cesspool, or other nuisance contributes anything, even 
during the heaviest rains, to the school-house well. If there is any sus- 
picion of contamination, the well must be dug iu another place. 

The most suitable position of the well on the supposed line of the 
underground flow having been fixed, a trial excavation will soon show 
whether water exists in sufficient quantity. If the exact channel should 
n<5t be struck at once, the excavation will probably show on which side 
it is situated, and the well may be extended toward that side. If copious 
springs are reached, nothing more is necessary than to dig out a shallow 
basin below them and then stein up the pit. If they are feeble, al- 
though probably sufficient, it is best to sink a deep excavation below 
them. 

A better supply may perhaps be thus reached, and, if not, the pit will 
serve as a reservoir, increasing the capacity of the well by so much. 
When all is ready, the well is to be steined up with rough stone or 
brick; the upper two or three feet should be built with hard brick in 
cement, and a brick dome in cement should be built over the top, leav- 
ing a fifteen inch manhole covered by a flat stone, set in cement. 
A well so built will be reasonably free from drowned toads, worms, 
grasshoppers, and other annual^ and if the suction pipe to the pump 
be made with the immersed end of block tin, as it should be, the danger 
of poisoning the children in their drinking water will be reduced within 
comparatively small limits. 

In alluvial, sandy, or gravelly countries, the tube or driven wells have 
some decided advantages. They are cheap and clean, the strainer at 
the point and the tight iron tube effectually preventing contamination 
from surface water or dead animals. In case of need, several tubes can 
be driven and coupled together, multiplying the capacity very greatly, 
but a l^-inch tube will generally supply all the wants of a small school. 
These wells are patented, and a royalty of $10 is now exacted by the 
patentee for each well, but the device itself is simple. The tube con- 
sists of ordinary wrought iron steam or water pipe, sometimes galva- 
nized, but more commonly enamelled either with the common black 
enamel or the red rubber coating of Morris, Tasker & Co., of Philadelphia. 
Sometimes the tin-lined iron pipe made by Tatham & Bros., 82 Beek- 
man street, New York, is used, although it is more costly. "The point is 
made separately and screwed to the end of the pipe before commencing 
operations. It is hollow, about 1£ feet long, and pierced with several 
hundred small holes whose united area is considerably greater than the 
sectional area of the tube. For most wells pipe is employed 1£ inches 
in internal diameter, and points are furnished ready made of that size, 

247 



12 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

but can be made of any dimensions. A section of tube, with the point, 
is driven into the ground by a mallet or a machine like a small pile- 
driver, according to the hardness of the ground, care being taken to 
keep it vertical. A piece is screwed to the pipe to hammer upon, so as 
avoid battering the pipe. When one length is driven home another is 
screwed on and sunk in the same way, and so on until water is reached. 
Various modifications are employed for particular soils, but the principle 
is the same in all. When completed, the well is connected with the 
pump by a lj-inch suction pipe, either directly or with the intervention 
of an air chamber and check valve, if the height from the water to the 
pump exceeds 27 or 28 feet. The cost of such a well driven in the 
vicinity of the larger towns is about $2 to $2.50 a foot in average soils 
where water is reached at a depth of not over 20 or 25 feet, including 
the royalty, together with the necessary point and tubing of enamelled 
iron. Another kind of driven well is made by boring, after the manner 
of an artesian well, under Pierce's patent. In this a 6 or 8 inch hole is 
bored first and a 2£-inch pipe afterward put down. The cost of this 
kind is about the same as the tube well, and they are sometimes success- 
ful where the tube wells fail to find springs. Besides they can be bored 
with perfect ease through the hardest rock or masses of bowlders, where 
a pipe cannot be driven. The cost of rock boring, with lining tube, &c, 
is about $7.50 a foot. It is a peculiarity of all these wells that the sup- 
ply increases after use, the flow of ground water toward the strainer 
opening for itself by degrees a freer passage. 

The water supply once secured, the next step should be to determine 
the position of the building upon the ground, which cannot, or should 
not, be definitely done before the successful sinking of the well. In 
general, a spot should be chosen from which the ground slopes naturally 
in every direction, if such can be found sufficiently near the level of the 
well to make sure that the lift from the water surface to the pump in 
the building will not be too great. A site of this description will afford 
a dry basement. 

Side hills are less desirable, as excavations in such situations are apt 
to be occupied in wet weather by temporary springs due to the flow of 
water from the higher land above. If, however, a sloping site is un- 
avoidable, the springs and water courses should be carefully noted after 
and during some heavy rain before the excavation is commenced, and 
avoided as far as possible. Level ground may be bad or good according 
to circumstances, but if wholly or partly surrounded by higher portions 
it is sure to be wet. 

Any moisture which may show itself under the proposed building 
must be cut off permanently by drains. Water flowing down a slope 
toward the site may best be intercepted by a semicircular trench inclosing 
the upper part of the building, a few feet distant from it. The trench 
. should extend some inches below the level of the lowest part of the ex- 
cavations for the building, and agricultural tile laid, or loose stones or 

248 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 13 

at the worst brushwood thrown in until it is half full. Then straw, hay, 
or the common eel-grass, which is the best of all, is to be placed on top 
in a layer 6 inches deep and the trench refilled with earth. If much 
water is found, the drains must be continued to some outfall, into a 
street gutter, for instance; if not much, the soil at the bottom and ends 
of the trench will probably be able to absorb it. Even when the build- 
ing is raised above the ground on posts, the subsoil should be protected 
from dampness by cutting off at least any moisture flowing through from 
underground springs at a higher level. If a continuous foundation wall 
is intended, whether inclosing a basement or not, the soil within the in- 
closure should always be protected on every side from the entrance of 
ground water by excavating the trenches for the cellar walls 18 to 24 
inches deeper than the proposed bottom of the basement and 6 to 8 
inches larger all around than the walls. In clayey or damp soils, or in 
any soil if the building is to cover more than 2,000 superficial feet, the 
depth of the trench below the cellar bottom should not be less than 24 
inches, and the vacant space in the trench outside of the foundation 
walls 8 inches, unless the stone is particularly square and well faced. 
If water stands in the trenches they must be graded to one corner, from 
which a drain pipe can be carried to some outfall. This being arranged, 
the trenches are to be filled to within 6 inches of the finished cellar bot- 
tom with dry pebbles, or broken stone or brick, well rammed down. 

From this point the foundation walls are to be started in cement, the 
first or footing course of the cement wall to be a little larger than the 
ones above it. The foundation walls should always be laid in cement 
mortar throughout, and if of stone should have the best face outside and 
neatly pointed. The extra width of the trenches will permit this to be 
thoroughly done. As fast as the wall is built the extra space is to be 
filled up with gravel. By this means the cellar of the building will be- 
doubly protected against dampness. Not only is the appearance of the 
ground water above the floor prevented by the drains beneath the walls, 
which collect and convey it away as fast as it rises, but the moisture, 
which in rainy weather trickles through the sides of the trenches and 
quickly penetrates walls built close against them, is intercepted by the 
shield of loose gravel, through which it descends, and is carried off safely 
by the drain beneath the footings. The smooth outer face of the wall 
facilitates this descent, and, there being no projections to retain water 
anywhere, the masonry soon dries. Where the outer side is, on the con- 
trary, left rough, with the joints unpointed, every projecting stone and 
every unfilled crevice catches a part of the water which trickles down 
by it and conducts it to the interior, causing incurable dampness. 

These few precautions, which cost almost nothing when applied at the 
right time, are of great importance to the future usefulness of the build- 
ing. Without a dry subsoil the most careful heating and ventilation 
will not secure a wholesome house, while, independent of considerations 
of health, the larger quantity of fuel required to sustain a given tem- 

249 



14 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

perature in a place where much of the heat must be absorbed iu vaporiz- 
ing condensed moisture, as*well as the rapid waste by deterioration of the 
iron and wood work exposed to a damp atmosphere, will soon show the 
folly of neglecting - to employ all possible safeguards at the commence- 
ment of the undertaking. 

Further details of construction will be found in their proper place. 

Second only in importance to the requirement that the site of the 
building shall be well drained and dry is the consideration of proper 
aspect and exposure. Together with these, regard must be had to the 
available means of approach and the position with respect to the road. 
Although this last matter is of comparatively little importance, inas- 
much as an intelligent arrangement of porches and a little judicious 
planting will give the structure a good effect, whatever may be its angle 
with the street, still, it should not be overlooked, and, indeed, there is 
no more certain way of giving picturesqueness and charm to a building 
than ingenuity in varying its plan from a given model to adapt it to dif- 
ferent circumstances. 

Neglecting for a moment the consideration of position with respect to 
the street as well as to aspect, the exposure of the building when com- 
pleted and the relative force of certain winds in the given locality should 
be noted. Not that the arrangement or lighting of the rooms will need 
to be altered on account of the greater or less exposure of the building to 
any given winds if care is taken in the construction, but to insure that 
this care shall not be forgotten, as well as to take advantage of natural 
features of the ground for modifying the discomforts of a bleak situa- 
tion, so far as may be without detriment to more important interests, it is 
well to devote some attention to the subject at the outset. 

In our climate the winds most to be guarded against are the north- 
westers of February and March; and, if the building stands on the side 
of a hill sloping north or west or if a valley running in that direction 
between neighboring hills directs the current upon it, extra precautions 
should be taken to cover the studding of wooden buildings with inner 
boarding and felt paper on that side, to glaze the exposed windows with 
double thick glass (which is many times less pervious to cold than the 
single thick), and to arrange the chimneys so that the stove or furnace 
may be placed well over toward the coldest corner. . 

Trees, especially evergreens, may with great advantage be planted to 
break the force of the cold northwest winds and even of the southeast 
gales, which, though of rarer occurrence, are in some localities excess- 
ively violent. A small obstacle is sufficient to affect the force of the 
wind very materially. A slight elevation or even a large bowlder will 
shelter a considerable space on its lee side, and, indeed, a defence not 
too extensive is preferable to an overhanging cliff or a hill higher than 
the building, the vicinity of which on the side from which strong winds 
come is sure to cause annoyance by down draughts in the chimney. 

250 



EUEAL SCHOOL AKCHITECTURE. 15 

ASPECT AND LIGHTING. 

For aspect it is hardly necessary to say that a gentle inclination of the 
ground toward the south is especially desirable ; the charm of land so 
situated is well fixed in the minds of most persons. Next to this the 
playground may slope east or west 5 not north, if it can be avoided. 

After all these considerations have been weighed, if the school-house 
plot still offers a choice of several sites, all equally well fulfilling the re- 
quirements we have noted, the farther selection between the different 
situations may be allowed to depend upon their relative position with 
regard to the road. While no point of healthfulness or convenience for 
the pupils should be sacrificed for the sake of pleasing the eyes of the 
loiterers in the streets, it is generally found impossible to keep a well 
used playground as neat and trim as a lawn, and for this reason it will 
be better with small buildings, other things being equal, to set the school- 
house between the road and the centre of the plot, reserving the portion 
behind it for playgrounds, while the smaller space in front may be orna- 
mented with flowers and kept neat and attractive. The entrances should 
be so placed that, without altering the aspect of the school-room itself, 
both of them may be visible from the street. Otherwise than this, the 
position of the building and the direction of the street have no necessary 
relation to each other. 

The essential consideration which should determine the orientation of 
the school-house proper absolutely, without reference to street lines or 
grades, is the lighting of the several rooms. We know that the sun rises 
in the east, is at its highest point in the south, and sets in the west 5 we 
know also positively the good and bad effects of different kinds and de- 
grees of lighting and varying amounts of sunshine, upon the eyesight 
and health of children ; hence we can deduce plain rules for laying down 
the lines of the rooms which they are to occupy, and these rules cannot 
be violated in deference to a real or supposed necessity without detri- 
ment to the usefulness of the building. 

It is agreed by all authorities that the most comfortable and wholesome 
light for the eyes is that coming from one side of the room, without inter- 
fering crosslights from windows in the opposite side or from front or 
rear, and it is furthermore desirable that the light should come from a 
group of windows, or a single one, rather than from a succession of them 
separated by wide piers, which cast annoying shadows. 

For writing or drawing the light should come from the left, not exactly 
at the side, but a little in front; then neither the head, the right hand, 
nor the pen will cast a shadow on the paper. For reading, the light 
may come from either side, indifferently, but should be a little back, 
that it may shine brightly on the page. For any purpose, the window 
must not be far off, or the light will be too dim, even though it may 
come from the right quarter. 

In arranging the more important schools, containing four or more 

251 



16 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

class rooms on a floor, o u wo modes of lighting are practicable: one, 
by windows in two adjacent sides; the other, by windows in one side 
only. 

Of these two alternatives, the latter should always be chosen. The con- 
fusion of crosslights at right angles to each other and the shadow of 
the head thrown forward are injurious to the eyes and the slight ad- 
vantage to be gained for ventilation by windows in the adjacent sides 
of a large room is not sufficient to weigh against the defectiveness of the 
lighting so obtained. The openings in the one illuminated side should 
be numerous and large, or the more distant x>ortions of the room will be 
too dark, and the seats should be so arranged that the light in each room 
will fall upon the left side of the pupils. 

Under this arrangement, with lofty rooms and large openings, the 
comfort of the eyes is at its highest point, and it is therefore compulsory 
n all German schools of every grade, and has become a common require- 
ment in planning the better class of school buildings in this country. 

For our climate, however, it may be seriously questioned whether, in 
small houses of one or two rooms, the value during the hot weather 
of the cross ventilation, obtained by opening windows in two opposite 
walls should not compensate for the inferior quality of the lighting. 

Some French schools have endeavored to meet the difficulty and com- 
bine good light with ventilation by piercing two opposite walls with 
windows and then concealing those on one side by permanent screens, 
like blinds, which allow the air to pass, but not the light. 

This expedient answers for high and well lighted rooms, but there is 
a further difficulty in the fact that in our low studded district and 
ungraded schools it is impracticable to admit from a single side sufficient 
light to supply the needs of the scholars. The minimum approved pro- 
portion of window opening for a school room is set down at one-sixth of 
the floor area, most authorities demanding much more. In one of our 
average rooms, 30 by 40 feet, the necessary window area would thus be 
200 square feet. Unless this amount of glass surface is provided, the 
pupils in the parts of the room farthest from the windows will suffer from 
insufficient light, which is far worse for the eyes than any possible cross- 
lights. Now, a simple calculation will show that, supposing the ceiling 
to be 12 feet high and the windows to extend from a line 4 feet above the 
floor to within a foot of the ceiling, to obtain the amount of opening 
demanded would require a succession of windows, say, 3£ feet each in 
width occupying the entire length of the longest side of the room, with 
piers between only 12 inches wide. It is plain that such a construction, 
though not impossible, is very different from anything which has ever 
been seen in our country school-houses ; yet nothing short of this would 
give the remoter parts of the room even a bare sufficiency of light, and 
hot that if any darkening by shades or blinds were permitted. 

From these reasons it follows, we think necessarily, that whatever 
may be the best practice in large buildings, whose high stories admit 

252 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCH*- ^CTURE. 17 

I : r \ ' 
the requisite surface of glass without reducing the piers to an imprac- 
ticable slenderness, and where artificial or forced ventilation keeps the 
air fresh without effort, small buildings of cheap construction can as a 
rule be neither properly lighted nor efficiently ventilated without win- 
dows in two walls, and these walls should be those on the right and left 
of the pupils as seated. 

By this arrangement ample window space can be easily given, with 
allowance for partial darkening by blinds at times; the light, though 
less comfortable to the eyes of perhaps half of the pupils than would 
be that from a single direction, will be more comfortable to the remain- 
ing half, and far more so to all, teachers included, than would be the case 
with windows in two adjacent walls, while the advantage of being able 
to change the air of the room in a few moments by opening windows in 
opposite sides, or by the same means to maintain a current in hot weather, 
is in our climate of very great importance. 

Adopting, therefore, the principle of lighting by opposite windows, it 
is necessary to consider the most advantageous aspect for these windows ; 
in other words, presuming that the openings will be made in the longer 
side of the parallelogram which constitutes the plan of the main school- 
room, the proper direction of the longer axis of the room is to be deter- 
mined with reference to the effect of sunshine in the room at different 
times of the day. 

So far as the comfort of the eyes is concerned, the north light is prefer- 
able, as it is comparatively unvarying, and through windows so directed 
there will be no sunshine during school hours, and therefore no need of 
shades or blinds, which are always to be avoided if possible. But the 
health of children in other respects suffers very seriously from the dep- 
rivation of the sun's direct rays, so that steadiness of light must be sac- 
rificed to the necessity for admitting them. Even the German rules recog- 
nize this, and require that while no room shall have windows on two sides 
only drawing class rooms shall face the north. 

Next to the north aspect, the steadiest light, as well as the greatest 
amount of sunshine, is derived from one due south, and" while a south 
window receives the sun nearly all day the year round, the angle at 
which it enters is so great that the annoyance from it in hot weather is 
infinitely less than from the horizontal rays which stream through an 
east or west window at certain times. For this reason, a south exposure 
is both cooler in summer and warmer in winter than an eastern or west- 
ern one, and while it secures the largest possible aggregate of sunshine, 
a south window needs less shading with blinds or curtains than any other 
except one facing north. 

On the whole, therefore, although some authorities hold a different 
opinion, the writer believes that the main room or rooms in small school 
buildings will be best placed with the longer axis directed due east and 
west, and lighted by windows in the north and south sides only. 
2 c i «53 



18 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

With windows in the east and west walls, as some advise, the sun s 
rays will indeed traverse the room from side to side, but only at the 
times when their purifying and light giving quality is at its least and 
their power of annoyance at its highest. Such a room is unendurable 
in summer afternoons without much pulling down of shades and closing 
of shutters, processes as disturbing to the quiet of the school as they 
are injurious to the eyes of the scholars, at the same time that the sum- 
mer breeze is shut out together with the sunlight. In winter a room 
so lighted is chilled on either side alternately, according as the north- 
west winds of March or the easterly gales strike upon the exposed sur- 
face of glass, making the room difficult to warm unless by using two 
furnaces, one or the other to be used, according to which side may be 
the cold one for the time being. 

With north and south lighting all these difficulties vanish. The con- 
dition of the room in relation to the furnaces will in winter be always 
the same, the north side being constantly cold and the south side warm, 
so that a single stove or furnace placed near the north wall will at all 
times diffuse its heat uniformly through the room. In summer the north 
windows will never need shading and those on the south only to a small 
extent. In winter the range would be much greater, though the annoy- 
ance would at that season be far less. In any case, the shading of a 
small fraction of the window surface will cut off all the rays which can 
possibly strike upon any desk, while a west window can be effectually 
shaded only by closing every crevice through which a horizontal beam 
can pierce. The advantage in hot weather of being able to have all the 
apertures on both sides of the room wide open, with fractional shades, 
if any, on the south windows, can be best appreciated by those who 
have tried both systems of orientation. 

Nor is the sunning of the room by south windows less effectual, but 
more so, than by east and west. The most obvious influence of sunshine 
upon the atmosphere of a room is to set it in motion, the chemical proc- 
esses of deoxidation or decomposition being too obscure for our senses ; 
but both chemical and mechanical effects are produced with greater 
energy by the noonday beams than by the heating, though lifeless, rays 
of a horizontal sun, and the circulation between the north and south 
sides of a room lighted from both quarters is the more active and con- 
stant by reason of the great dissimilarity in their condition, one being 
always shaded and cold and the other always warm. 

The shape and size of the sashes is au important matter. 

The height of the room will be generally about 12 feet, and if the win- 
dows are carried to within 6 inches of the ceiling the total height of the 
frame will be 7£ to 8£ feet. So high a sash ought not to be over 3 feet 
wide, and both parts should be well counterbalanced, so as to encourage 
their frequent opening. A heavy or badly hung sash will rarely be 
opened, from the simple physical inability of teacher and children to 
manage it. A ring should be screwed into the top of the upper sash, 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 19 

and a pole and hook provided to operate it. The glass should be in 
rather small lights for cheapness of repairs, and double thick on all ex- 
posed sides. The English double thick is heavier than the common kind. 

Shades and blinds should be avoided as far as possible. Outside 
blinds are generally condemned by writers on school architecture, as 
liable to get out of repair and difficult to manage. Moreover, they 
require so much wall space to fold back against as to restrict the num- 
ber of windows and prevent the grouping with small piers, which gives 
the best light. 

Inside shutters may be used where "brick walls or furred projections 
give the necessary space for folding them back ; or, better still, Venetian 
blinds can be easily made or obtained which pull up against the soffit 
of the frame by means of a cord, passing through holes in the ends of each 
slat, and attached to the lowest one. These are made both of wood and 
iron. Still better, but more costly, are the rolling shutters, which coil, 
by means of a spring, into a box either above or below. 

The cheapest device of all is the ordinary shade, which should be made 
of stout holland, never of paper or painted cotton, and strongly and 
accurately hung. This has the objection of shutting out air in summer 
as well as sun, and a modification may be used, consisting in a short 
curtain, only half the height of the window and moving up and down 
by means of the ordinary brass pulleys and endless cords, to which it is 
secured along the edges by rings and hooks. 

This will be quite sufficient to intercept all unwelcome sunshine, and 
will still leave half the window opening free for admission of air. The 
securing of each edge of the cord keeps the shade stretched and in 
good condition indefinitely, and no rollers or springs are required. For 
the north windows no shade whatever will be necessary. 

It is important that the sills of the windows should be as much as 4 
feet above the floor. If less than this they cause a glare in the eyes of 
the pupils sitting near them. 

The danger which some writers fear that high window sills will de- 
velop an irresistible inclination on the part of the pupils to climb up 
on them in order to see out may be counteracted, j)erhaps, by increased 
effort to make the school room itself attractive. 

To compensate for the height of the sills above the floor, the window 
heads should be carried as close to the ceiling as the construction will 
admit. Four inches is all the distance which need generally be given 
in frame structures, and even in brick buildings the sash can be carried 
nearly as high, as will be seen further on. The illumination of the ceil, 
ing so obtained is of the greatest value, the light reflected from it being 
peculiarly soft and grateful to the eyes, while the proper ventilation of 
the room is greatly assisted by making the windows as high as possible. 

Aspect must also be considered in regard to the entrances, which, in 
a word, should always face the south. A south entrance gives a breath- 
ing place for the children in rainy or blustering weather as they approach 

255 



20 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

or leave the building and protection to the interior from the March north- 
westers or easterly rain storms, which will blow in at an outside doot 
exposed to them with such force as to make themselves felt through the 
whole school-room whenever the door is opened ; it gives dry and clean 
approaches to the building after snow storms, in place of impassable 
drifts ; and last, but not least, shelter for those too punctual scholars 
who are sure to arrive before the building is open in the morning. 

So important has experience shown the southerly aspect for entrances 
to be that to this necessity is perhaps due the fashion of east and west 
lighting for the school room proper. The "classical" style of school 
planning not being able to conceive of entrances in any other position 
than in the gable end of a building, a south door involved necessarily 
east and west windows, and vice versa. Now, however, the spectre of the 
Greeks has ceased to reign over our architecture, and whatever ingenuity 
is shown in contriving south windows as well as doors will be rewarded 
by the applause of the elders as well as the gratitude of the children. 

There may be situations where a south exposure is impracticable for 
one or both entrances. In such a case, much may be done by contriv- 
ing porches, which, although entered from the east or west, or even from 
the north, can have wide windows toward the south, and angles or 
screens which may shelter the early arrivals from the cold winds. 

SURROUNDINGS. 

The choice of site and orientation of the building being thus deter- 
mined, certain details of planting and laying out the school lot remain 
to be considered before the requirements of the school-house itself are 
taken up. If anything in the size of the lot or the conformation of the 
ground prevents ample space from being given to the rear playground, 
it is much better to set the building as far back as possible, and give 
up the whole front space to the children's games. Not only will the 
available area be thus made the most of, but, if the school-house is 
judiciously arranged, the playground will be brought on the south side 
of the building and thus sheltered from cold winds, while the sun re- 
flected from the walls will add much to its cheerfulness. 

However the playground may be situated, it is best left clear, with- 
out interruption by trees or shrubs. These are only in the way of the 
ehildren's sports, and they soon get mangled and broken by thought- 
lessness or accident ; their shade is of no use in such a place, and they 
are liable to be used as screens to conceal doubtful actions from the 
eye of the teacher, whose vigilance it is well that the pupils should never 
be sure of escaping. 

The ground should be grassed over with the closest and thickest turf 
possible, and base ball stations and similar places of excessive wear 
should be shifted every few weeks, to prevent the sod from being trod- 
den away entirely. Wherever the natural sod is good it is best to leave 
it intact, as a thick sod is of very slow growth. Defective places may 

256 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 21 

be patched during the construction of the school-house with sods from 
the site of the building and from the paths. 

If new grading makes it necessary to raise the grass from the begin- 
ning, all the loam accessible should be spread upon the surface. Two 
feet in depth of rich loam is not too much ; the growth of the sod will 
be much more rapid in such a soil; and the whole should be thickly 
sown with red-top grass, with a little admixture of white clover. 

The front space, where such an area is reserved distinct from the 
playground, may with advantage be treated differently by planting 
with trees, particularly evergreens and flowering shrubs, only taking- 
care that no tree of any kind is allowed to stand at a less distance from 
the school-house than twice its own natural height when fully grown. 
The good effect of trees is reversed by allowing them to stand too near a 
building. While they may actually be used to dry up a marshy spot, by 
the great quantity of water which they take up through their roots and 
disperse by means of their leaves into the air, these same roots, near 
a cellar wall, will keep it damp as would the vicinity of a great wet 
sponge, and the shade of their branches, if allowed to fall on the school- 
house, not only deprives it of so much wholesome sunshine, but the 
moving shadows on the windows or curtains cause a flickering of the 
light which is distressing and injurious to the eyes. 

In its proper place, however, a considerable amount of planting is 
permissible, with the best results. Shrubs, rather than trees, should 
be chosen for the most part. 

There are few portions of the United States where Missouri currant, 
barberry, Weigelia, cornel, laurel, lilac, roses (white, yellow, and red), 
viburnum or Guelder rose, California privet, Forsythia, spirsea, tartarean 
honeysuckle, dogwood, deutzia, holly, magnolia, catalpa, and rhodo- 
dendron will not grow well in the open air on the south side of a build- 
ing, and in the Southern States many more may be added. 

Damp spots may be improved by covering them with clusters of the 
beautiful pyrus japonica, and porches may be ornamented by climbing 
vines, such as ivy (English, German, or the small leaved varieties), wood- 
bine or wistaria, roses and honeysuckles; and if any one will take the 
trouble to sow the seeds in spring, the red and white cypress vines, the 
fragrant jessamine, morning glories, and the purple and white Japanese 
clematis may be added. 

Any experienced seedsman can suggest varieties enough to keep some 
of the vines and shrubs constantly in bloom for nine months of the year, 
and a judicious selection of seeds, supplemented by slips from private 
gardens and young shoots transplanted from the woods, will cost 
almost nothing, while the civilizing influence of their beauty upon the 
children's minds, together with the pride and interest which their gar- 
dening operations Avill awaken, should not be undervalued. 

It is best to plant several varieties of shrubs together in clumps. The 
dark evergreens or the holly and laurel then set off the brighter kinds, 

257 



99 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



and the mutual protection which they afford each other against the 
winds helps the growth of all, while, if one should die, it may be re- 
moved without leaving an unsightly gap, and such gardening, especially 
if the bushes are planted directly in the grass, is less troublesome than 
the cultivation and training of regularly spaced rows of bushes or beds 
and borders of small flowers. The clumps should vary a good deal in 
size and in the kinds of plants comprised in them. A large mass may 
be set between the front of the school-house and the street and will add 
much to the attractive and retired air of the building. 




d!l.ffi.J...i..[.tiJJ. 

IJNl.i l ll| l |llilil l l,\ l illl l llt 'l ll»H | l l niai l | l III I U | IIL l ' I 



The grass in the front or ornamental ground should be fine and short, 
the ground neatly graded and abundance of loam placed on the top 
and sown with the seeds of such grasses as will form a thick and per- 
manent sward. 

The edges of the paths cannot be trusted to grow neatly with sowing 
only, however profusely the seed may be scattered : an edge about two 
feet wide must be sodded. For this, the best sods should be selected 
and laid on a deep bed of loam, thoroughly wet to receive them, and 
they should be kept moist for a few days. The walks themselves may, 
if gravel is not at hand, be made of coal ashes and cinders, which, 
though dusty at first, soon harden into a good surface. Coal tar con- 
crete is, however, much the best material to use. 

258 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



23 



More elaborate landscape gardening will be well repaid in the gen- 
eral interest which a well laid out school-house lot will excite in the 
neighborhood, and the cost of all the work which can be applied to an 
acre of ground is not great. If a landscape gardener is accessible, his 
advice will be the best security against mistakes, but something may- 
be done by unprofessional taste, keeping due regard to the style of the 
building, whether formal or picturesque. The structures of classic, 
type, like the Grecian temples once fashionable for schools, and the 
Renaissance designs of some of our best modern buildings gain very much 
by a little terracing. This gives straight lines and smoothly sodded 
banks around them, and helped by a few garden vases of iron, or, better, 
artificial stone, which carry out, so to speak, the formality of the build- 
ing into the landscape, softens the harshness of the contrast between 
them, and greatly increases the apparent importance of the structure. 




•>vxMvKa v fWwA- 



For the fencing, a little taste will answer as well as expense. Build- 
ings in classical style need a certain heaviness in the inclosures, and 
posts of masonry are most suitable. Bricks, if well burned and hard, 
may be laid in cement so as to form durable and handsome fence posts, 
especially if stone can be. used for copings and for bonding the work 
(Figs. 3, 4, 5, 6). The intermediate portions may be of thinner walling 
or of open woodwork, or a construction intermediate between the two, 
consisting of wooden rails filled in with brickwork four inches thick 
(Fig. 7). 

If creosoted lumber is used there is no danger of rot from the dampness 
of masonry. 

259 



24 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



For more picturesque buildings, the fencing may be wholly of wood 

(Figs. 8, 9). 



FIG. 5. 





260 



EURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



25 



Fig. 7. 




2G1 



2G 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



Very pretty and durable inclosurcs are made by landscape gardeners 
of red cedar or other durable poles, with the bark on, consisting of 
posts with top and bottom rails well secured together and the inter- 



sc^&S 




Fig. II, 




vals filled with pieces of random lengths nailed in in any direction, 
the only care needed being to keep the network so formed uniformly 
open, not thick in one part and thin in another (Figs. 10, 11). 

ARRANGEMENT. 

The arrangement of the school-house itself is now to be considered, 
keeping in view the requirements as to lighting and aspect of main room 
and entrances which have already been discussed and accepted as set- 
tled for all cases where imperative necessity does not overrule them. 
But if certain further general rules can be deduced from study of the 
habits and necessities of teachers and scholars, it does not follow that 
such rules will be universally applicable. On the contrary, there are 
few cases where a very considerable amount of ingenuity will not be 
necessary to adapt the form and arrangement of building acknowledged 
to be the best in theory to the different exigencies of situation, size, or 
cost which must to some extent govern in each particular instance ; and 
it should be one of the recognized duties of school superintendents to 
see that a due degree of mental energy is expended upon the problem. 

It is most unwise to delegate to the builder the task of shaping a 
model plan to fit a particular position. Not only will he generally lack 
the knowledge if not the disposition requisite for determining the di- 
mensions of the rooms with that close regard to the number of pupils, 
the mode of seating, the kind and therefore the size of desks, the form- 
ation of classes and consequently the width needful for aisles, the best 

262 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 27 

mode of heating and ventilation under tlie given circumstances, which 
is necessary to success, but, even if fortified with what he supposes to 
be ample experience, his knowledge will very often prove to be derived 
from books or works which, however good in their time, have in the 
rapid development of modern sanitary and social science long since 
become obsolete. 

Few persons know from actual examples how greatly the skilful plan- 
ning of a school building facilitates the work carried on in it, but an 
idea of the possibilities of good planning may be negatively arrived at 
by observing the disadvantages of bad or ill considered arrangement, 
which may be studied in great variety in most of our country schools. 
Let any teacher, superintendent, or member of a committee, on visiting 
a school, notice for an hour or so the continual petty interruptions, 
annoyances, and distractions caused to pupils and teachers in ordinary 
school rooms by the moving about to stir up fires which have not a 
proper chimney draught or to pull down shades for excluding trouble- 
some sunbeams; by the frequent rests, sometimes on the part of teacher, 
sometimes of scholars, to relieve the eyes from the painful glare of a 
front light ; by the confusion and relaxation of discipline which follow 
the collision of classes in narrow doorways or of pupils in the tortuous 
and inconvenient passages among the desks, and the countless other 
annoyances which follow from the improper position of windows, desks, 
stoves, and doors, and he will realize how large is the weekly aggregate 
of time thus wasted. 

The remedy for this is thought, the careful thought of some one 
thoroughly familiar with school business and ready to sacrifice all other 
considerations to the welfare of the school ; one who can in imagination 
follow each scholar through his work and play, who can see before him 
the classes in order and sympathize with the trials and understand the 
duties of teachers and pupils. Such a man should sit in judgment upon 
every school-house plan, whether modest or pretentious, whether made 
by an architect or by the apprentices in the builder's shop. 

^In his criticism he should abandon at once all those preconceived 
notions of symmetry, proportion, classic elegance, or Gothic aspiration 
derived from books or from the vague recollection of a few examples 
which are apt to influence amateurs much more than architects, and 
devote himself solely to determining whether the heights of stories are 
too great for proper hearing or too small for ventilation ; whether the 
staircases are wide enough and numerous enough for safety, and not too 
steep for little legs; whether the windows are sufficiently high and of 
suitable extent, and so placed that their light will fall whereit is wanted; 
whether the ventilating and warming apparatus is well out of the way 
of the school operations, and, unless he can trust the architect's knowl- 
edge, whether it is judiciously planned in accordance with the latest 
practice. The dimensions of the rooms should be tested with reference 
to the desks to be put in them, and the width of the resulting aisles 

263 



28 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

between the desks calculated to an inch, in order that their sufficiency 
may be assured, while auy superfluity of space may be curtailed. 

This most necessary work of preliminary criticism, before plans of this 
kind are carried into execution, may be performed by any intelligent 
teacher or school superintendent, with the help of such guides and books 
of reference as may be procurable. 

By such individual thought and criticism only can a thoroughly good 
mode of school planning be formed in this country, as has been done in 
England through similar censorship, with the imperative demand that 
certain requirements shall be fulfilled ; and if the following notes are 
found applicable in suggesting and assisting such criticism, the writer 
believes that this work will be more serviceable than if he were to devote 
himself to the collection of a certain number of model plans, which, how- 
ever interesting in themselves, are seldom of much service, except when 
interpreted by the light of well understood principles. 

Taking up the component portions of the proposed buildings in the 
order of their importance, the main school room should be considered in 
a few words. 

The form of this room would hardly need discussion if it were not that 
fantastic shapes are from time to time proposed and occasionally adopted. 
It is sufficient to say that the figure long proved to be best for hearing 
and seeing on the part of the pupils, with easy supervision on the part 
of the teacher, is a parallelogram, the length of which is a quarter or a 
third greater than the breadth. In the middle of one end is the desk of 
the teacher, who has his school thus before him, within reach of his 
voice and so disposed that he can observe every movement without 
turning his head or straining his eyes. 

For supervision alone a long and narrow room would be most suitable, 
so that the whole school would be comprehended by the teacher within 
a comparatively small angle of vision, but sufficient width must generally 
be provided (or drawing out classes, either in front of or behind the 
desks, and a compromise must be made between these two opposite re- 
quirements. 

In accordance with the rules of lighting and aspect previously pro- 
posed, the room will have its longer axis directed east and west, and 
will be lighted by windows occupying nearly the whole length of the 
north and south walls. 

The entrances, which must be separate for the two sexes, should be so 
planned that both boys and girls may be under the eye of the teacher 
in entering and leaving the room. They may be in the wall behind him, 
a very common position, but are better either in the side or opposite end 
walls, so that, without turning his head, his glance may follow them 
through the vestibules until they are out of the building. This plan 
will prevent the silly tricks which children carry on in the vestibules 
sheltered from the teacher's observation, to the amusement of their fel- 
lows but to the detriment of discipline. The best arrangement will be to 

264 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 29 

put one entrance door in the side wall, near the teacher's end of the 
room, and the other in the opposite end wall. 

The side door maybe appropriated to the boys, who will thus be nearer 
the teacher and more under his control in entering and departing, and 
the end door, which will be behind the pupils, to the girls. 

The room being lighted alike on both sides, the pupils may sit facing 
either the east or west, but there are many advantages in arranging 
them to face the west. By this disposition the girls' entrance is brought 
on the sunniest and most sheltered part of the building, as it should be, 
and in interior planning the stove or furnace, which must be at the north- 
west'corner of the room, comes in front of the pupils, where it finds the 
largest space and where its heat is diffused with the greatest comfort 
to all. 

The best place for the blackboards is the end wall behind the teacher, 
the whole of which will be available, except what small portion may be 
occupied by doors to class room or teacher's room. If more space is 
needed, the opposite end wall may be used. 

The piers beside the windows, though often fitted with blackboards, 
are unsuitable. The strain upon the eyes in trying to decipher marks 
on boards so placed, in the face of the glare of light from the windows, 
is very severe, and such positions, if occupied at all, should be left for 
coarse maps and diagrams on a large scale and in bright colors. 

In the simplest cases, the large school room and its separate entrance 
porches or vestibules for boys and girls, with wardrobes for each and 
connected outbuildings, will form the whole of the structure. 

More important buildings will have in addition a teacher's room and 
one or more recitation rooms; but these can and should be joined to the 
main body without interfering with the disposition, aspect, or lighting 
of either school room or entrances, the requirements for which are the 
same in houses of all the lower grades. 

A good rule for vestibules is that the outside doors shall be placed at 
an angle with those opening from the vestibules into the school room. 
This will cut off the direct impulse of the wind and exclude draughts 
with ten times the effectiveness of outside and vestibule doors in par- 
allel walls. They should be light and sufficiently spacious to give the 
crowd which pours out of the school room doors at recess a little breath- 
ing space before they are pushed into the open air. 

Attached to each vestibule should be a large wardrobe. These may 
open directly from the school room, and should always do so where there 
is danger of their being robbed, but the smell of wet clothes in raiuy 
weather, especially in poor neighborhoods, is penetrating arid disagree- 
able, and a better disposition is to open the wardrobes from the vesti- 
bules, these being at the same time so arranged that the teacher can 
observe everything that goes on in either of them. 

With panels of clear glass in the inner doors, these can be shut with- 

265 



30 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

out interfering with this supervision, which is useful also for other par- 
poses. 

Besides the wardrobes, each vestibule should be furnished with wash- 
bowls and roller towels. It is not necessary to have expensive plumb- 
ing to enable teachers and children to keep themselves as clean as they 
desire. All that is needful is a commou cistern puinp in each vestibule, 
with a lead or enamelled iron suction pipe to the well, and an earthen- 
ware or tinned copper basin, or sink if preferred, with a waste pipe to 
a dry well outside. This will cost a trifle, perhaps $50 in all, if the well 
is not far away. At 6 per cent, interest, this would bring the cost of 
keeping' a school of 50 pupils clean up to 6 cents each a year. • 

A further investment for towels and rollers, with weekly allowance 
for laundry, is advisable, but not absolutely necessary. 

The pumps may be had with a pin hole iii the valve, so that the water 
cannot stand long enough in them to freeze, and traps in the waste pipe 
may be dispensed with as unnecessary, so that there will be no other 
part of the apparatus to be injured by frost. 

On no account must the waste pipe empty into the privy vault. By 
such carelessness will not only foul gases be poured into the vestibules, 
wardrobes, and school room, but the admixture of water renders the 
contents of the vault doubly offensive ami dangerous. 

In towns with public water supply the arrangement will be a little 
different, but some means of cleanliness may always be had. If noth- 
ing better offers, the rain water of the roof can be collected and used. 

In regard to certain other appliances for cleanliness and health, per- 
haps the most essential of all, much must depend upon circumstances. 
The distance between the best and the worst is so enormous that the 
writer can do no less than urge most earnestly that the very best ap- 
paratus should be always used where it is possible, at the same time 
that he considers it his duty not to overlook the very poorest and 
cheapest contrivances, which must sometimes of necessity be endured. 

It is sometimes asserted that a school privy should never be under 
the same roof as the school room, and certainly it should not open into 
it, nor should the vault be placed where its contents can by any possi- 
bility contaminate the soil beneath the school rooms, but with proper 
construction and ventilation it can be brought without offense, if not 
under the same roof, at least within reach of sheltered and decent com- 
munication, and one improperly built and cared for should not be allowed 
upon a school-house plot in any case. 

The advantages of placing the closets in communication with the 
school room are numerous. To say nothing of the dangerous exposure 
in winter to a delicate child in leaving a hot room and traversing perhaps 
the length of the playground to a miserable shed through which the wind 
blows freely, or of the no less injurious repression of the natural functions 
which the dread of such exposure occasions, the blunting of the natural 
modesty of children and the opportunity of corrupting themselves and 

266 



SURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 31 

others which is afforded to the degraded ones by the shiftless, indecent, 
and promiscuous arrangement and condition of the ordinary school priv- 
ies urgently demand that these necessary appliances should receive at 
least as much care as the other circumstances of school life. 

How deeply children may be dragged down by their school associa- 
tions is well known to experienced teachers and physicians, and even 
the public is sometimes startled into attention by the revelation of the 
condition into which such influences, joined to the horrible knowledge 
derived from the books which certain criminals delight to scatter among 
the young, may bring a school. Even young children are liable to have 
a bias given to their thoughts which they will bitterly regret in later 
years. 

For these reasons all the delicate precautions with which good archi- 
tects help the occupants of dwelling-houses to conceal from each other 
any suggestion of the degrading necessities of their common nature are 
tenfold more necessary in planning for school children, whose minds are 
far more susceptible to the influence of their material surroundings, 
while they have not the restraint of intimacy and affection to check 
prurient curiosity. 

In the first place, the conveniences for the two sexes should be abso- 
lutely separated, out of sight and out of mind each from the other. 
They should be well ventilated, a little off the main thoroughfare, but 
not at the end of a long passageway, nor in any place where one must 
pass by a window or across a door to reach them. They should be, how- 
ever secluded, in the same group as the wardrobes or woodshed, so that 
a person passing in that direction is not necessarily going to or from them. 
This seems a small matter, but it is not ; it is one of the established rules 
of planning among architects, and especially in planning for children, 
whose modesty it is peculiarly necessary to consider. Yet the closets 
should not.be far removed from the observation of the teacher, or even 
from supervision by the public opinion of the scholars. As the dark 
and filthy outhouse, scrawled with obscenity by wandering tramps, in- 
duces carelessness in children, if nothing worse, so a light and neatly 
finished closet, with proper provision of urinals and water tight floors, 
will be an object of pride even among boys, and they will readily co- 
operate with a teacher in keeping it clean and discountenancing the 
filthy habits of the rougher class. But, to remove temptation, all should 
be light, open, and in a sense public, each latrine to its own sex. There 
should be conveniences enough for all the children, dark corners should 
be avoided, inside as well as outside the building, and such angles as 
cannot be dispensed with should be overlooked by windows' from some 
frequented place. Even clumps of shrubbery should be so arranged as 
not to form retreats for careless or dirty boys. This care in arrange- 
ment, so that no part of the building or grounds can escape observa- 
tion, is of great value in assisting discipline, breaking up bad habits 
among the scholars, and encouraging manliness and. modesty. 

267 



32 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

Having arranged the position of the retiring places with due regard to 
convenience, unobtrusiveness, cleanliness, and privacy, the kind of ap- 
paratus to be employed is next to be decided. Independent of cost, the 
question whether water closets, earth closets, or common privies should 
be used depends upon the amount of care which can be given to them. 
A good water closet is undoubtedly the best appliance which we have, 
but it involves an expense in drainage and supply which is seldom al- 
lotted to country schools, and the risk of being rendered useless by 
freezing is considerable, especially with the best closets. Those which 
are called "hoppers" can be arranged with the trap below ground, out 
of reach of frost, but unless by good fortune there is a large and con- 
stant supply of water these are liable to become serious nuisances. In 
general, it is well to remember that the stench from an inferior or dilap- 
idated water closet is more penetrating even than that of a foul privy, 
and that a privy vault can be disinfected much more easily than a bad 
drain. In ordinary cases, the best resource is some form of earth closet, 
which, when properly cared for, is inodorous and is equally available in 
all weathers. The form of closet employed should be specially designed 
so that the scattering of the earth over the matter in the vault may be 
done by an independent mechanism from the outside. In this way the 
pulling of a lever or turning a crank once a day will accomplish all the 
requisite disinfecting, and the weekly visit of an intelligent laborer, who 
should make the rounds of the school-houses to fill up the reservoirs of 
dry earth and remove the contents of the vaults, will be all that is neces- 
sary to maintain the sanitary condition of the buildings. Further de- 
tails will be found in their proper place. 

If the town is unwilling or unable to do even this much for its children, 
the common privy vault must be accepted as a necessity. In that case, 
although it is both practicable and advisable to retain it in close con- 
nection with the school room, provision should be made by a short ves- 
tibule, ventilated by blind slats in the sides, or some similar arrangement, 
for intercepting and sweeping away the emanations of the closets before 
they can enter the rooms. By this precaution, with a small and tight 
vault ventilated as hereafter described, little or no nuisance can reach 
the school room. 

The school room, vestibules, wardrobes, and closets will in some cases 
constitute the whole of the plan, but most schools will require, in addi- 
tion, either a woodshed for storage of fuel or a space for cellar stairs, 
if the basement is used for that purpose. 

As a rule, unless furnaces are set in the basement, it is both better and 
cheaper to store wood, and still more coal, in a shed on the ground level 
than under the school room floor. Some coal, especially when wet, emits 
sulphurous vapors in considerable quantity, and any old wood pile fur- 
nishes evidence that the fermentation of sap and the decomposition of 
animals give rise to vapors which are best removed from all possibility 
of contaminating the school room air. 
268 




Eaco, page 33. 




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c3 
ft 
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RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 33 

The woodshed may adjoin the boys' vestibule, and by placing it on 
the northwest corner it will serve to shield the vestibule on that side 
from the cold winds. 

These divisions constitute the simplest form of school-house. For 
convenience of reference, a plan fulfilling the requirements so far noted 
is given here, showing (Fig. 12) the main axis of the school room directed 
east and west, the two porches facing the south, the girls' entrance door 
opening in the end wall opposite the teacher's desk, and the boys' door 
in the side wall beside the platform, the woodshed adjoining the boys' 
vestibule, with suitable arrangement of closets and wardrobes. 

In the plan given, the outside steps may be covered by a gabled roof, 
which protects them from rain, snow, and ice, and the consequent decay, 
and gives the children who bring umbrellas an opportunity to get under 
shelter before closing them, while the gabled form prevents the snow- 
slides and dripping eaves common to picturesque porches. 

The most desirable position for the stove being in the open space in 
front of the pupils and at the left of the teacher, and this being also, 
with the orientation here adopted, by far the most favorable position for 
warming the room uniformly in cold weather, it will be convenient to 
place the chimney in the northern part of the west wall near the stove. 
For an ordinary stove a flue 8 by 8 inches is large enough, but a chim- 
ney of a single flue of that size quickly bends over and finally decays, 
so that it must be made 8 by 12 or 8 by 16 inches, or, what is much bet- 
ter, a ventilating flue built in the same stack. The cost of the stack is 
not very much increased, and the advantage of having a ventilating 
flue in such a position, where the draught will be quickened by the heat 
of the adjoining smoke flue, is considerable. Besides, the solidity as 
well as the external appearance of the chimney is greatly improved by 
increasing its size. 

The ventilating flue, if smooth inside, must be at least 20 by 20 inches; 
this is the smallest permissible sectional area of a warmed shaft, straight 
and smooth and of considerable height, for winter ventilation of a school 
room occupied by 48 pupils. 

If a smaller flue is used, additional wooden shafts will have to be pro- 
vided in other parts of the room to obtain proper movement of the air, 
and as the motion of the air in pipes diminishes much more rapidly than 
their sectional area, the cost of the wooden trunks will be found greater 
than that of the brickwork saved and the effect much less. 

A consideration which should not be lost sight of in planning small 
schools is the possibility that it may become desirable to add one, two, 
or more recitation or class rooms and a teacher's room or library, and 
an arrangement of ground plan and elevations which will permit this to 
foe done with the least alteration of the portion previously built will be 
very generally useful. 
The plan given admits of such extension, as shown by the dotted lines. 
3 c I 269 



34 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

The teacher's room and class room near the platform are well situated 
for use, and the position of the chimney is fixed where its flues can be 
used for the stoves of the new rooms and for ventilating the same. As the 
elevation shows (Fig. 13), the new roof can join the old without any 
alteration of the latter, nothing being necessary but to take off the board- 
ing and finish from the walls next the new rooms, plaster, and cut the 
requisite doors. 

Additional class rooms may be provided also at the opposite end in a 
similar maimer, without interfering with any of the old doors, windows, 
or other parts of the construction ; but, unless the building is heated by a 
furnace, rooms added at this end must be provided with a new chimney. 

It sometimes happens that two large school rooms are required, and 
Figs. 14 and 15 show how the model plan may be doubled without sac- 
rificing the better points of the arrangement. This double plan may 
have recitation rooms added if necessary. 

In planning buildings of this class it is always necessary to keep in 
mind the requirements which are peculiar to the business of a small 
school, and to recognize the difference between them and the large 
structures with four rooms on a floor, where, for instance, it is the rule 
to place the axes of the building diagonally with the cardinal points, in 
order to secure sunshine in all the rooms, an object which is much better 
attained in the one or two roomed structure by placing it square with 
the cardinal points. 

The dimensions and to some extent the shape of the rooms will de- 
pend upon the seating. The utmost number of pupils which should be 
allowed to one teacher is fixed by the best authorities at 48, and each 
teacher should have a separate room ; but there are certain advantages 
in ungraded schools in having the school room large enough to accom- 
modate a greater number. In country districts the attendance varies in 
character according to the season. In summer the larger children 
are occupied at home and the school is filled with small ones, while in 
winter the older boys and girls have leisure to attend but the inclem- 
ency of the weather keeps the little ones away ; so that, although the 
average attendance may be not over 48 scholars, there should neverthe- 
less be an extra provision of small desks for summer and of large ones 
for winter, increasing the number to about 60 places in all. Otherwise, 
in the cold season, stout children must be crammed into the infants' 
desks, and during the rest of the year some of the little ones will have 
to be seated at desks too large for them, with serious risk in both cases 
of causing malformation in the young and tender bodies. The additional 
air space gained is of value also, and, in a rapidly growing neighborhood, 
such a room may, in case of necessity, be temporarily utilized to its full 
capacity by the employment of a second teacher and the addition of reci- 
tation or teachers' rooms, if they do not already exist. The plans here 
given will therefore be arranged for about this number. 

The exact dimensions of the main room will furthermore be dependent 

270 



RURAL SCHOOL AKCHITECTUEE. 35 

on the kind of desks used. It should be unnecessary to say that the 
proper way to plan a building of this sort is to determine the number 
and size of desks and the width of aisles and platform first of all, then 
to construct the walls to inclose just the space desired and no more; not, 
as sometimes occurs, to fix upon some haphazard dimensions for the 
room, and when it is ready cram the desks in somehow, the result be- 
ing that the room presents in one place large useless spaces and in an- 
other aisles so narrow that the children can only squeeze through them 
sideways. 

Taking things as they are, not as they perhaps ought to be, the ma- 
jority of ungraded schools are likely to use double desks, and the plan 
will be first laid out for such, leaving till later the arrangement to suit 
the single desk seating. 

The dimensions of double desks vary according to the maker, and the 
utmost economy of floor space will be secured by determining upon the 
kind to be used before commencing the construction of the building. 

The folding seat desks, which are desirable, especially for young chil- 
dren (because they allow the pupils to stand upright in their places, turn 
the seats back, and in that position take part in various calisthenic or 
other exercises), occupy a little more room from front to rear than the 
old kind, but are made somewhat shorter, the average length being 40 
inches for the double seat, and the floor space from back to back 30 inches. 

The aisles between the rows of double desks should be two feet wide. 

The teacher's platform, or a space for the desk if a platform is not 
used, will be 5 feet wide, and 3 feet, at least, must intervene between 
the front of the platform and the front row of desks. 

Three and a half, or, better, four feet should be allowed between the 
rear seats and the wall, and aisles next the side walls are necessary, 3£ 
feet wide if blackboards are to be placed there, or 3 feet if they are 
dispensed with. 

There should be not more than four rows of double desks. The ad- 
vantage of shortening the school room by increasing the width is more 
than counterbalanced by the annoyance to the teacher of constantly turn- 
ing the head in trying to take in a wide angle of vision. 

Three rows of desks would give a room of better form still for seeing, 
hearing, and economical construction, but the width of such a room, 
amounting to 20 feet only inside the finished walls, would not be suffi- 
cient to allow the drawing out of large classes in front or rear of the 
desks. With four rows, therefore, as a standard, the desks, being 40 
inches long, will require 13 feet 4 inches; three 2-foot aisles between 
them will add 6 feet; and the two side aisles, each 3£ feet wide', 7 more; 
making the total width of the room, inside the finished walls, 26 feet 4 
inches. 

For the depth, the teacher's platform will take 5 feet ; the front aisle, 
3 more; eight desks, at 2£ feet each, will add 20 feet; and the rear aisle, 
which must be 4 feet if there is any possibility of adding recitation rooms 

271 



36 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

on that end, brings the total to 32 feet, and gives seating capacity for 
61 pupils of all ages. 

If it is decided to use single desks, which are rapidly superseding 
double ones in the more intelligent communities, the dimensions of the 
room will with advantage and economy be somewhat different. 

The usual width for aisles between single desks is 18 inches ; six rows 
of desks, therefore, at 2 feet each, with five aisles, at 1£ feet, will take 
19 J feet; two side aisles will, as before, add 7 feet, making 26 .J feet. To 
accommodate 60 pupils, there will be 10 desks in each row, at 2£ feet of 
floor space for each, which, with 8 feet in front and 4 in rear, gives 37 
feet for the depth of the room. 

The height of the ceiling should not be less than 12 nor over 14 feet. 
Thirteen feet is quite sufficient for any school room, and although the 
volume of air contained in a lofty room is larger a comparatively low 
one is more easily ventilated by flues and the air more quickly changed 
by opening the windows, and the acoustic quality of a room so nearly 
square as a school room must be deteriorates with great rapidity as the 
height of ceiling passes beyond 12 feet. Lower posts still would be 
admissible in small rooms for 24 to 40 pupils, if the ceiling were carried 
up with the roof by plastering on the rafters and collar beams, but col- 
lar beams are hardly practicable in roofs of 25 feet span. 

The window sills will be 4 feet above the floor, and the heads should 
extend close up to the plate, which will allow about 5 inches for archi- 
trave. 

A wainscoting should be carried around the room, or, at least, across 
the blackboard ends. Under the blackboards it should be 2 feet 4 inches 
high. This will be high enough to protect the dresses of the children 
from the chalk, and will not bring the blackboards too high for conven- 
ient use. Usually the cap of the wainscot is formed of a gutter shaped 
moulding to catch the chalk dust and hold crayons, but an ingenious 
carpenter can easily make a suitable cap by bevelling a square piece of 
wood inwards. 

The blackboards should extend 4J to 5 feet above the wainscot, bring- 
ing the top edge 6f to 7 feet above the floor. One large one should 
occupy the whole extent of the wall behind the teacher's platform, and 
a similar one the opposite end wall, while smaller ones or maps may 
be placed beside the groups of windows. Certain simple diagrams 
showing graphically the areas of different countries and their pro- 
ductions have been made which will be very suitable for such places. 
A small moulding or batten may run along the top of the blackboard 
as a frame. 

The teacher's platform may be from 6 to 8 feet long and about 8 
inches high. Some teachers prefer to dispense with it altogether, think- 
ing that they can make their work more effective by moving about con- 
tinually on a level with their scholars instead of overlooking them 
quietly, but such cases are exceptional. 

272 



SGHOC 



Fig. 14 




M tlT 





































SCHOOL ROOM 






































BOYS' ENTRANCE 



GIRLS' 
WARDROBE 

AND 

DRESSING 

BOOM 



GIRLS' 
WARDROBE 

AND 
DRESSING 

ROOM 





































SCHOOL ROOM 





































ADDITION] OF 
CLASS ROOM 



VENTILATING FLUE 



ADDITION OF 
TEACHERS ROOM 



COAL & WOOD 
\ VENTILATOR 

11 II li L 

BOWLS URINALS 



Face page 36. 




RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 37 

The stove, if the room is to be warmed in that way, should stand in 
the vacant northwest corner of the room ; and, if furnace heat is em- 
ployed, the furnace should stand nearly under the same corner, and 
registers should be placed in each angle. 

In this way the delivery of hot air will be equal at each register, 
whereas, if the furnace were set in the centre of the basement, the de- 
livery would in cold weather be mostly on the south side of the house 
the greater weight of air in the northern half of the room, chilled by 
the impact of the cold wind, being sufficient to determine the current 
away from that side. 

The recitation rooms may be 10 by 15 feet, or even smaller. Their 
furnishing will consist of benches or specially designed seats around 
the wall and a small desk and a chair for the teacher. Blackboards 
should line the walls. 

For a teacher's room almost anything, even a closet, is better than no 
such room at all. Six feet by ten is large enough to be of great use. 
Book shelves, hooks for hanging clothes, or, better, a small press, and a 
few cupboards, with two chairs and a small table, complete its furnish- 
ing. Neither teacher's room nor recitation rooms need be so high 
studded as the school room. 

Wardrobes may be 12 inches deep, if there is wall space enough ; if 
not, by making them 18 inches deep hooks may be put on the inside of 
the doors, and room thus economized. The hooks should be triple, of 
malleable or wrought iron, if the cost is not too great, and screwed to 
strips in two rows, one row being put 6 feet or so from the floor for 
the large scholars, and the other not over 4 or 4J feet for the younger 
ones. The hooks should be 8 inches apart in each row, and those in one 
row should be vertically over the middle of the space between those in 
the other. Ten feet in length with double strips will give 30 hooks. 
Each hook should be numbered and one allotted to each child. Six 
inches over the top row of hooks should be a shelf, and the remaining 
space to the ceiling may be occupied with additional shelving. 

For overshoes, the lower part of the wardrobe is, in the better schools, 
occupied with ranges of pigeonholes 4 or 5 inches square. Five inches 
square, or 4 inches by 6, is not too much in country districts at the north, 
where rubber boots need to be accommodated, and, if the case is made 
of half-inch stock, a wardrobe 10 feet long will give room for 30 boxes, 
numbered like the hooks, in two rows, with a cupboard in addition where 
lunch pails may be stowed away. A little ingenuity only is needed to 
secure the requisite accommodation in very limited spaces. 

The whole should be shut in by strong doors, which may fasten with 
a slip bolt, or if preferred by a lock, the key of which will be retained 
by the teacher during school hours. Holes bored in walls and doors 
will give ventilation. 

If it is possible to turn a current of warm air from the furnace in 

273 



38 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

among the clothes to dry them in wet weather the health of the chil- 
dren will be thereby promoted. 

Water closets and privies are simple in arrangement, but a few sug- 
gestions may be useful. They are in the country generally made far too 
large. Two feet and a half is all the width necessary or advisable, and 
four feet in depth is sufficient. Never, under any circumstances, should 
there be two seats in the same inclosure. 

If a special seat for young children is necessary it should be in an in- 
closure by itself; but with seats made rather low, 15 inches from the 
floor, and the holes not too large, all children of school age will be suf- 
ficiently well accommodated. It is sometimes necessary in rough dis- 
tricts to prevent standing on the seats in the boys' closets. This may 
be done by a wide board inclined from a little above the back of the 
seat, forward to a point nearly over the front edge, or by a strong bar 
20 to 24 inches above the seat. 

The boys should always be provided with urinals, which may consist 
of a trough of wood or iron inclined toward the outlet and the requisite 
number of board partitions, 18 to 20 inches apart; but a better arrange- 
ment, because of its greater privacy, consists in stalls divided by parti- 
tions as before, but each furnished with a separate iron urinal, enamelled, 
if the best and most durable article is desired. Corner urinals are in 
some respects the best, and a large number may be set in a small space 
by placing them on opposite sides of a zigzag partition. Whatever kind 
is used, the lipped pattern should be chosen. This saves the dripping 
and consequent foulness inevitable with troughs, or even with urinals 
of the ordinary shape. 

The screens should be 6 feet in height or more. In very many deli- 
cate and nervous boys nature refuses to perform its usual functions, how- 
ever great the necessity, in the presence of others or under unaccustomed 
circumstances, and a decent privacy in the school conveniences is nec- 
essary to save such from daily pain and often more serious consequences. 

The urinals may discharge into a single pipe, emptying into the vault, 
and all woodwork above them should be well painted and sanded. The 
floor under them should, if possible, be of slate, marble, or concrete, 
with a gutter formed in it, draining into the main waste pipe. In gen- 
eral as little surface as possible should be exposed to defilement, and 
that little should be non-absorbent, and capable of being washed clean 
with a few pailfuls of water. 

A few details of general planning may be best inserted here, and will 
serve to close the subject of arrangement. 

All the doors from the interior of the school room to the exterior air 
should open outward. This precaution, which the law makes compul- 
sory in city school-houses, should not be neglected in the smallest build- 
ings. It is necessary, in consequence of this arrangement, to have a 
landing at the top of the outside steps at least 4 feet wide, so that a child 

274 




Face page 38. 



Fig. 15 



EUEAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 39 

standing on the top step when the door is suddenly thrown open from 
the inside may have room to draw back without falling down the steps. 

Double doors are often useful in large schools, but, if used, should be 
not less than 5 feet in width. Other doors may be 3 feet wide, and, in 
general, 6 feet 8 inches to 7 feet is sufficient height. It is a common mis- 
take to have doors too high . If ventilation is provided for independently 
of them, as it always should be, the larger they are the greater will be 
the volume of cold air admitted when they are opened and the more 
danger there will be that they will warp and admit dangerous draughts 
even when closed. Fanlights over them, however, are useful in warm 
weather. 

Stairs and steps of all kinds should be very low and easy for chil- 
dren's use. Five inches in height are enough for each riser, and outside 
steps may have treads 12 inches wide with advantage. 

CONSTRUCTION. 

The proper mode of construction for school buildings is hardly less 
important than suitable arrangement. More, however, even than 
arrangement, must it depend upon circumstances of local habit, relative 
cost of different materials, and the absolute expense allotted for the 
proposed building. 

Nevertheless, there are certain principles of good building which 
are applicable to all materials, and these should be kept constantly in 
mind. Perhaps the simplest mode of making suggestions will be to 
describe, first, a model construction, in which the best ordinary materials 
for their several purposes shall be indicated throughout and described 
as employed in the best way ; then, although circumstances will prob- 
ably rarely admit of the literal following of the model, there will be few 
cases where it will not furnish useful hints as to the proper employment 
of such materials as may be used, and it will be of a certain use to have 
the model fixed in the mind, even though it be for the time unattainable. 

As often happens, the common system is far from being the best or 
the cheapest in the end. All the disadvantages and dangers which fol- 
low from the adoption of the light and inflammable structure of stud- 
ding and boards in dwelling-houses are multiplied when the same sys- 
tem is applied to schools, as many terrible occurrences bear witness, and 
in isolated cases very successful efforts have been made at an improved 
construction. 

From the light of these experiments and similar ones, the best prac- 
ticable construction for a school building of the humblest grade would 
be about as follows : 

The site having been carefully selected and drained as before described, 
the cellar may be excavated to a uniform depth of about 3 feet below 
the original surface of the ground. The sod, if good, should be stripped 
off and utilized at once in improving the remoter portions of the lot. 
The loam should be piled separately, to be put subsequently on top of 

275 



40 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



the grading. The gravel or earth will be disposed of as the nature of 
the ground may require, but on a reasonably level spot all the excavated 
material will generally be used in raising the ground to a gentle slope 
around the building ; not a steep bank, but a grade of one in ten or so. 
The trenches for the foundation walls should be dug 2 feet below the cel- 
lar bottom and 18 inches of dry stone filled in and rammed down before 
starting the walls; the excavation should be made 8 inches larger 
than the wall, as before described, and the wall carried up with smooth 
outside face to the height set for the under side of the first floor. This 
will vary according to circumstances. If the building is to be warmed 
by a furnace, the height of the basement should be about 8 feet. Not 
only is anything less than this insufficient to give head room under the 
hot-air pipes, but the heating is much more certain where the basement 
is high enough to allow a good pitch to the, hot-air pipes. If there is no 
furnace, 6£ feet clear will give sufficient head room, and, indeed, if the 
fuel is stored above ground, 3 or 4 feet under the beams may suflice. 
The thickness of the foundation depends upon the material and upon 
the thickness of the wall above. Where it can be procured, rubble stone, 
of granite, slate, greenstone, trap, or any of the harder rocks, makes a 
perfectly satisfactory foundation for a building of the kind proposed, 
being comparatively impervious, and therefore little liable to soak up 
ground moisture, to give it out again from the inner surface; while, for 
the same reason, the ground does not freeze to the outside in winter, 
gradually tearing to pieces a wall built of them, as it does a brick or soft 
stone foundation in cold climates. If the wall above is of rubble it will 
be usually 16 inches thick, and the foundation must be from 20 to 24 
inches thick, according to the character of the stone, rounded bowlders 
demanding greater thickness than the flat pieces of slate. A hollow 
brick wall above will be from 12 to 16 inches thick, and a 20-inch rubble 
or 16-inch brick foundation will suffice. A frame building, if there is a 
cellar under it, should have a rubble wall 18 to 20 inches thick, accord- 
ing to the character of the stone, or a 12-inch brick wall will do if it is 
protected against the pressure of earth from outside and from the disin- 
tegrating action of frost in clayey and clinging soils by a good thick 



./wVyvA"^ 



/ks^j^JW-* 



Fig. 16. 

envelope of clean gravel. A solid 8-inch brick wall above will need a 
similar foundation. If no cellar is required, the trench wall for the foun- 
dation should still be 18 inches thick if of stone or 12 inches if of brick. 
276 



KURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



41 



Nothing less than these will long withstand the winter frosts. In the 
South, frame buildings are very generally built on piers or posts, and 
with strong sills and good piers this is a durable and economical con- 




Fig.17. 

struction. It should, however, be frankly shown by raising the sills 
well above the ground. If earth is graded up against the sills they will 




inevitably rot in a few months. The unpleasant looking hole beneath 
the sill may be filled with sawed sheathing, as in Figs. 16, 17, 18, 19. 




Pig. 19. 

The piers should be very substantial, 18 inches square if of rubble 
stone or 12 by 12 if of brick. The 8 by 12 or 8 by 8 brick piers com- 
monly used begin to bend in a few years. Wooden posts may with 
advantage and economy in many cases be made of spruce lumber cre- 
osoted by the Hayford process. This is done by the Hayford Wood 
Preserving Company, in Boston or New York, and the timbers so treated 
are more durable and reliable than cedar or locust. If distance renders 
it impracticable to obtain these, posts of red cedar or locust wood, or 
even white cedar and chestnut, may be used, but the best of them rot in 
the course of years, and the frost lifts them readily, so that such sup- 
ports are generally the dearest in the end. 

In iron districts refuse lengths of cast iron pipe are sometimes used 

277 



42 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



for posts with very good results. The corrosion is slow, especially if the 
posts are well painted and the ground does not freeze to them, so that 
buildings so supported are unaffected by frost. In any but the hardest 
soils a good sized flat stone should be set for the pipe to stand upon. 

Whatever kind of basement is adopted, ample openings for ventila- 
tion should be provided. It is true that a well aired cellar, unless there 
is a furnace in it, makes it necessary to plaster the cellar ceiling or to 
lay the upper floors double, to prevent them from being intolerably cold 
in winter; but this is only part of the price which must be paid for a 
wholesome and enduring structure. 

The walls above the basement will be of brick, stone, or wood, accord- 
ing to circumstances. 

Solid brick walls of the required height may be 12 or even 8 inches 
thick, and must be furred with wooden strips 1 by 2 inches, nailed to 
the inside, and these strips lathed and plastered, the air spaces thus 
formed between the plastering and the inner surface of the wall being 
necessary to keep external dampness from penetrating into the room. 
Stone walls must be at least 16 inches thick, and the roughness of their 
inner surface rendering it impossible to nail furring strips to them inde- 
pendent studding must be set up iuside, precisely as in the case of a 
frame building, and this lathed and plastered. 

The concealed flues of combustible material thus formed, extending 
from cellar to roof, conduct sparks and flame in a few moments from any 
portion of the building to every other, without the possibility of discov- 
ering or arresting it in transit. Hence it is that the so called stone or 
brick buildings in which a fire kindled in the basement is likely at any 
moment to run up behind the furring and break out in the roof are in 
many respects more dangerous than frame structures. 

Attempts have been made to make walls of masonry impervious to 
moisture from without by covering them with paint or cement, so as to 
obviate the necessity for furring, but it is found that such impervious 
walls condense the moisture of the room on their inner surface to an in- 
convenient and unwholesome extent. The 
only effectual remedy for these evils lies in 
the use of hollow walls, of brick throughout 
or with stone facing, as may be preferred, 
and such walls are by far the best to inclose 
school rooms. 

Such a wall, of the height proposed, should 
be 16 inches thick, the air space being 4 
inches, the outer wall 8, and lining wall 4 
inches, and tied by continuous " withs" at in- 
tervals of about 2 feet. Each "with" is to 
be built with headers bonded alternately 
into the outer and inner walls. The corners 
should be built solid. (Fig. 20.) _ 

278 



FI6.20. 



EUEAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



43 



The outer wall should be of the hardest bricks, the semi- vitrification 
of the surface being very necessary to prevent the conduction of water 
from the outside into the lining wall. 




Fig.2! 



The inside of the air space should be made reasonably smooth, leaving 
holes at the bottom to facilitate cleaning out, and at the completion of the 
wall ail mortar and shavings, remnants of hard-boiled eggs, bread crusts, 




and other vestiges of the workmen's presence should be cleared out and 
the holes built up. At the cornice the air space will be covered over 
and a level bed of mortar spread for bedding the plate. A small open- 

Fig. 23. 




HW 



ing should be left at the bottom of each air space opening into the base- 
ment, and another at the top opening into the external air. By these 
a constant current of air will be maintained through the hollow. This 
is essential to the dryness of the wall. 

It is best to build ^ or f inch iron bolts into the solid work at the cor- 
ners to secure the plate. These should be 2 feet long and have a washer 
2 by 4 inches or so at the bottom, and must be so set that 4 or 4£ inches 
of the upper end will project above the top of the wall. This end has 

279 



44 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



a screw thread cut on it, and corresponding holes are bored in the plate, 
so that when this is laid on the ends of the bolts will appear above the 




"i ~" r " i 



Fig. 24. 



upper surface, and washers and nuts are then applied and screwed down. 
By this means the roof is firmly held to the walls. 

Simple cornices may be formed by projecting bricks, as in Figs. 21, 22, 
23, 24, 25. 

Fig. 25. 





In such buildings as we are considering a considerable saving of ex- 
pense is made and a picturesque effect obtained outside, as well as great 
advantages for lighting and ventilation inside, by carrying the window 
openings up to the under side of the wall plate without arch or lintel, 
as shown in the figures below. 

A cornice of brick may be made, if desired, stopping! at the window 
openings, as in Fig. 26, but the effect will be quite as good, especially 
if common bricks are used, to finish the wall without any projection, and 
mould or cut the edge of the plate, either on the solid or by planting on 
mill mouldings. The former is much the better way. A boy with a 
280 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



45 



hatchet can hack the square edge of the timber into a "dog-tooth" 
ornament which will be sufficiently picturesque (Fig. 31). 




Fig.26. 



In country buildings it is quite possible with the aid of red mortar to 
make a good looking exterior wall of common hard bricks, instead of 
using face brick, the cost of which is from two to six times that of the 
others. The mortar is to be colored with Venetian red or any similar 
red ochre or mineral paint, which is added in sufficient quantity to pro- 

Fig.27. 




duce the desired tint. Pounded brick, if nothing better can be had, will 
serve as a coloring material. The red mortar, by obscuring the joints 
of the brickwork, gives a smooth appearance to a wall which would 
look intolerably rough if laid in black or white, and the variety in tint 

281 



46 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



of common bricks gives to a wall built of tliem in this manner a pict- 
uresque play of color. 

The bond can also be used to give a simple but pleasant decoration to 
the wall by means of the darker color which the headers should have. 




Owing to the way in which bricks lie in the kiln, the ends or heads are 
burned more than the sides, and as it is particularly important that the 
bonding bricks in one wall, which show their ends in the exterior, should 
be well burnt, those which possess the requisite hardness will have their 
heads burned to a dark red, blue, or black shade. 

The ordinary bond for an 8-inch wall, which consists of a continuous 
row of headers every fifth or seventh course, will then give the wall the 
appearance of being barred with faint horizontal lines 10 or 15 inches 
apart. (Fig. 32.) 

Flemish bond consists of alternate headers and stretchers in each 
course (Fig. 33), and different arrangements can be made, a variety of 
which may be used in the same building. (Figs. 34, 35, 36.) 

The inside face of the hollow wall may be treated either by plastering 

282 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



47 



it, which may be necessary if the bricks are poor or rough, or what is 
better by laying the brick work of the lining wall neatly and leav- 
ing it exposed. With the cheaper kinds of face brick quite a beautiful 





m 






Fig. 51. 

effect may be obtained, and even common hard brick, if selected with 
care and laid in red mortar, will make a much neater wall than might 

Fig. 32. 




283 



48 



CIRCULARS OP INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



be supposed, especially if helped out with a course or two of moulded 
bricks uear the top, to form an interior cornice. (Figs. 37, 38, 39, 40.) 

Fig. 55 . 

— m^ — — w%% — wjm — — ¥%%% wffift ^ — 



l 



_j 



■ 









m ' m 






__t 



A great variety of patterns of these are made and each being 8 inches 
long the number of any particular pattern wanted can be easily calcu- 
lated. They are sent as freight, packed with hay in barrels, in any 



FIG. 34. 




■ 




number desired, from 10 to 10,000, at 4 or 5 cents each, and form a cheap, 
durable, and beautiful means of decoration. They are made in Phila- 
delphia (Peerless Brick Company), in Brooklyn, N. Y., and several other 
places, of red clay, and white ones are made of fire clay by Sayre & 
Fisher, Sayreville, N. J., and at Clark's Terra Cotta Works, Ottawa, 
Canada, and Glen's Falls, H". Y. 

284 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



49 



The lower part of the wall will be protected from rubbing by a wain- 
scoting- of wood. 



Fig. 35. 




The blackboards should properly be slabs of rubbed slate, secured 
with iron holdfasts to the brickwork, or the blackboard space may be 
plastered with cement and covered with the ordinary coating of so called 

Fig. 36. 



i_ 



Q. 



Wf 



w 



i 



i • ■ • -i 



"liquid slating," which will make an infinitely better board on such a 
foundation than on the usual lathing covered with soft lime plaster. 

Nothing can be more picturesque and pleasant in color to the eyes 
than such a wall, in place of the usual cracked and grimy plastering, and 
the bare brickwork has the important advantage of giving the freest pos- 
sible circulation of air through the wall itself. 

In constructing the ceiling it is desirable to avoid the ordinary light 
fabric of small timbers and laths, which in case of fire burns rapidly 
4 c i 285 



50 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



and falls in. It is quite possible to build with little more expense a 
roof and ceiling which will burn slowly, if at all, and will not fall for 




hours after they begin to blaze, giving time for the quiet removal of the 
pupils, their books aud clothes, in place of the wild terror and confusion 
excited by the hay-stack-like conflagration of the usual mass of kin- 
dling wood which fills school-house attics. 
The general principle to be observed is to support roof and ceiling by 

286 



KUKAL SCHOOL AECHITECTUEE. 



51 




287 



52 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



a few large timbers, rather than a multitude of small ones. This must 



be applied as circumstanees may direct, 
by G rafters, 20 inches from centres, sup- 
porting inch boards, the rafters were 
made G by 8, 8 feet on centres, and 
covered with 2-inch or better 3-inch 
plank, the amount of stock and labor 
taken together in the roof would not be 
very greatly increased, while the latter 
construction would resist fire for hours 
after a light ordinary roof had fallen 
into a heap of cinders. 

Ceilings also, instead of being hung 
from the rafters, should be independent, 
supported by thick beams crossing the 
room, and furred with strips under- 
neath. If the expense of wire lathing 
can be incurred, a nearly fire proof ceil- 
ing can be made ; if not, at least it can 
be made secure against falling all at 
once. By laying 2 or 3 inch matched 
planks on these large ceiling beams a 
still better ceiling may be made, which 
can be lathed and plastered beneath 

or even 



If, for instance, instead of 2 




FIG. 42 



neatly finished and white- 
washed or painted, while the upper 
side may form a flat roof. The thick- 
ness of the plank covering prevents 
to a great extent the heating of the 
room by the sun in summer and keeps 
out the cold in winter. 

Floors, if inflammable material is 
stored in the basement, may with 
advantage be similarly constructed, 
heavy beams, 6 or 8 feet apart, being 
covered with matched 3-inch plank. 

Little need be said about the roofing 
material. There is a fashion that 
brick buildings should have slate 
roofs, but it is only fashion. Many 
brick and stone structures are now 
roofed with shingles on account of 
the cheapness and tightness of such 
roofs, which remain perfect until the 
shingles rot, while the repairs on an 
ordinary slate roof begin on the day the slaters leave it. 
288 




RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



53 



A slate roof is, however, often a matter of necessity, and it is worth 
remembering that by laying each slate in a bed of cement, spread on the 
upper part of the slates below, the roof is very much improved. The 
cement keeps the slates from rattling in the wind, the chief cause of their 
destruction, and is itself s o protected that it can never wash out. 

Metallic shingles, made in New York by the Iron-clad Manufacturing 
Company, form a tight and durable roof, at an expense not much greater 
than slate. 
Plat roofs may be covered with tin, felt, tar, and gravel, felt, asphalt, 

and gravel, or, best of all, asphalted 
felt overlaid with thick slate, tile, or 
brick, bedded in warm asphalt. This 
is not much more expensive than the 
others, if slate or tile is accessible, 
and remains perfectly fire proof and 
water proof indefinitely. The flat 
roof is not objectionable in appear- 
ance, as may be judged from the 
sketches shown hereafter. 

Next to a building of masonry, the 
most comfortable and substantial 
houses are those of logs. A good 
log wall, well chinked, is far more 
impervious to wind than the con- 
struction of studs and siding boards 
through which the winter winds 
whistle freely, resisted only by a lay- 
er of brown paper or imperfect "back 
FIG. 44. plastering," and, rough as the log 

houses are commonly supposed to be, this mode of building is capable 
of most beautiful and picturesque forms. Figs. 42, 43, and 44 are from 
Swiss chalets, which are log houses pure and simple, with the sole ad- 
dition of a little care in squaring the logs or planks neatly and a little 
fancy in cutting the ends, which are left projecting, into grotesque 
shapes. Many a southern or western log house is as neatly built, and 
only the suggestion will be needed to enable an ingenious workman to in- 
vent endless picturesque devices, which a spare day or two will suffice 
to carry into effect. 

The Swiss carpenters fit their timbers beforehand so accurately that 
when brought on the ground they "come together" without the aid of 
nails or spikes. Even the rafters hold on the plate by simple notch- 
ing, small purlins or laths are notched to them, and large shingles, or 
rather pieces of slabs and boards, are laid on top with considerable lap 
from the eaves to the top ; and, to keep these down, poles are placed on 
them every three or four feet and heavy stones laid on the ends of the 
poles, the whole structure being thus often finished without a single nail. 

289 




54 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 




291 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



55 



They have little wind in their valleys ; probably we should be compelled 
to nail our shingles, but we can imitate their neatness and lively taste. 
Fig. 45 gives a suggestion for a school-house in the Swiss style, which 
any ingenious backwoodsman could carry out. 

The common timber construction of studs covered with siding boards 
alone, or inner boarding and clapboards and shingles, is the poorest of 
all apologies for building ; nevertheless, it is too common to be neglected, 
and if children cannot be sheltered by substantial masonry or logs at 
least the thinly covered frame of studs may be improved by following a 
few suggestions. 

The sill, which should be 5 by 10 or 6 by 10, must be laid in a bed of 
mortar, spread on top of the foundation wall to receive it, and any irreg- 
ularities in the top of the wall must be filled up with stone chips and 
mortar. In this way only can the wind be kept out from under the floor 
boards. The sill should be set on edge, as the portion next the founda- 
tion will gradually rot, and the margin for decay will thus be larger. 

By painting the under side of the sill with a heavy coat of cheap 
paint before laying, its duration will, however, be greatly prolonged, the 
paint repelling the dampness of the foundation wall. 

The floor beams are next laid, 16 inches apart from centres. Country 
carpenters, to save a few inches of 
siding boards, often notch the sill 
for the beams, and cut these with 
a projecting tenon 2 inches deep or 
so, at the upper edge, so that when 
this is laid in the notch the top of 
the beams is flush with that of the 
sill. By this arrangement, not 
only do the beams hang down be- 
low the sill so as to interfere with 
the foundation wall, to its and their detriment, but the tenon is very 
liable to split off, as Fig. 46 shows, dangerously weakening the floor. A 

much better way is not to mortise the sill 
at all, but to notch the beams to within 4 
inches of the top, lay them in place, and 
spike tkehi through the side. The 4-inch 
tenon will not split off, and the mortising of 
the sill, a great source of rot, is avoided. 
(Fig. 47.) 

If it is decided to employ the old fashioned 
or braced frame, as it is erroneously called 
(since the balloon frame admits of far better bracing), the posts will next 
be setup, mortised into the sill, the plate and braces, also mortised, put 
in place, and the tenons pinned, this skeleton being afterwards filled in 
with ordinary studs. 
For a balloon frame all the studs are set up at once, 16 inches apart, 

290 





Fig. 47 



5G CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

one being generally set beside each beam and spiked to it and to the 
sill without mortising. Even the corner studs are not mortised, and 
consist simply of two common studs nailed together. 

After all are in place and held plumb by stay laths at intervals nailed 
diagonally to the studs and to the beams, and a few siding boards put 
on, the upper ends are sawed off level and the plate laid on top of the 
stnds. Usually the plate consists of two studs, laid one above the other, 
the first being spiked through into the ends of the studs and the second 
spiked to the first. 

The upright studs may be spliced by cutting the ends of the pieces 
square and " fishing" them with pieces of board nailed on each side. 

When the siding boards and laths are on, the joint is inclosed in a 
box, from which it cannot escape. 

By each side of doors and large windows two studs should be set and 
.spiked together, to offer proper resistance to the slamming of the door 
or blinds, as well as to prevent any bending toward the unsupported 
side. 

The bracing of a balloon frame is the most important part; without it, 
such a frame deserves the abuse which conservative builders heap upon 
it. The great object is to secure long braces, reaching from sill to plate 
if possible, and at an angle with the vertical of as near 45° as may be. 
The best way, supposing the studding to be 2 by 5 or 3 by 4 inches, is 
to use 2 by 4 or 2 by 5 for the braces, and gain them 2 inches into the 
outside of the studding, so that the whole will be flush, then spike to 
every stud. Such bracing is independent of shrinkage, which soon 
opens a little play in the angles of the old fashioned frames. Inch 
boards are often used for bracing, instead of 2-inch joist, but should be 
well nailed to be effective. 

After bracing, the walls are to be inclosed. This, in the cheapest 
houses, is done with planed boards 8 or 10 inches wide, the lower edge 
of each overlapping the top of the one below. 

This is very little protection against cold or wet, and in all the better 
(class of structures an inner skin is put on of cheap boards, usually 
planed one side to reduce them to a uniform thickness, without which 
the exterior finish could not be properly put on. This should be covered 
with two thicknesses of felt paper, and the clapboards or shingles put 
on over; without paper, a sun-warped clapboard or shingle may admit 
wind and drifting snow. 

Contrary to the common idea, a shingle covering is tighter and warmer 
than clapboards and much more lasting, although not so finished in 
appearance. 

Even where neat at first, the shingles shrink after painting, showing 
the fresh wood between, which gives a ragged look to the surface, and 
the dipping or painting the edges, which will prevent this, is expensive. 

The interior of the studding is lathed and plastered. In cold climates 

293 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



57 



it is usual to back-plaster by nailing fillets to the sides of the studs or 
on tlie inside of the boarding and short pieces of lath to these, then plas- 
tering, pressing the mortar up to the sides of the studs as much as pos- 
sible. 

All this makes a construction as inflammable as any incendiary need 
desire. Something may be done to lessen its dangerous qualities by 
lathing with wire lath instead of wood, but this is expensive. A more 
effectual and cheaper mode is to lay five or six courses of cheap brick 
and mortar on top of the sill, between the studs, filling all around full of 
chips and mortar, repeating the process once or twice in the height of 
the wall, by nailing bits of board to the studs, laying pieces of joist 
upon them, and building up the brickwork on these. 

The best of all, however, is to fill up the spaces between the studs en- 
tirely with blocks of perforated concrete. The concrete may be made 
with mortar, plaster of Paris, and cinders, but it will generally be much 
cheaper to get it ready made, as furnished by the Fire-proof Building 
Company, 21 Cortlandt street, New York, or 52 Lexington street, Balti- 
more, or J. J. Schillinger, 111 Broadway, New York, and doubtless by 
other parties. It is said that the roof, walls, and floors of such a struct- 
ure can be thus made practically fire proof at an additional cost of 
about 10 per cent, over the unprotected construction, a trifling expense 
compared with the great advantage gained. 

Boofs of frame buildings may be shingled and painted to give a cer- 
tain brightness of effect. Mineral paints are the cheapest and are gen- 
erally used. Yenetian red, Bocky Mountain vermilion, Iron clad paint, 
Prince's metallic paint, Brandon brown, and many others cost from 2 
to 4 cents a pound. Indian red is the most beautiful color, but if good 
is considerably more expensive than the others. 

A different mode of inclosing is sometimes seen, in which vertical 
matched boards are nailed to sill and plate and to horizontal " inter- 
ties" between, and the joints covered with battens. The battens must 
have the edges bevelled or rounded, or they will curl up and admit 
water, and it is well also to hollow out the back with a plane to assist 
it in hugging close to the joint (Figs. 48, 49, 50). For outbuildings with- 






Fig.48. 



Fig.49. 



Fig. 50. 



•out plastering, where the studs can be 3 or 4 feet apart, this mode is 
economical, but in places where the studs must be set close for nailing- 
laths it is neither weather tight nor cheap. 

Interior finish is in such buildings not a complex matter. Upper 
floors should if possible be of Georgia pine, in narrow, matched strips, 
4 inches wide or less, and well soaked with hot linseed oil when first 
292 



58 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

laid. This, if the applications are repeated until the wood refuses to 
imbibe more, will give a hard, polished, impervious surface, which can 
be easily washed and does not become filled with dirt like an ordinary 
floor. 

Wainscoting* and door and window trimmings are best of hard wood. 
Ash is generally used, being common and cheap. Chestnut is coarse 
in grain and soon gets a dirty look. White wood (basswood or tulip- 
wood) is still cheaper, and, though not very hard, does tolerably well ; 
it darkens very much with age, and should have the nail holes con- 
cealed as much as possible, otherwise the putty used to fill them up at 
first will, as the wood darkens, appear conspicuously light. Maple may 
be used if not too expensive. It is the best of all woods for floors, being - 
particularly close grained. Butternut and black walnut are handsome 
but costly. All these woods need to be finished by the painter. 

The simplest application is a coat of linseed oil, to bring out the grain, 
followed by one, two, or three coats of shellac varnish. This should be al- 
lowed to harden and then be rubbed down with fine emery cloth dipped in 
linseed od. Oiling alone is sometimes thought sufficient, but, the pores 
not being filled, the wood gets black by handling. The pores of ash, 
chestnut, or black walnut are so large that shellac alone will not fill them, 
and they must first be rubbed over with a paste of oil, turpentine, and 
whiting or wax, or with " patent filler," so that the varnish may covi r 
them smoothly. 

Oak alone, of all woods, may be used without filling or painter's work 
of any kind, its naturally hard, glossy grain needing no help from var- 
nishes. It must be carefully seasoned and used with understanding of 
its qualities, but so employed is one of the best finishing materials. 

Soft woods must sometimes be used for finish, and may with advan- 
tage be oiled and varnished with shellac, like the hard woods. This will 
keep them from showing finger marks, as is inevitable where the wood- 
work is painted. • After rubbing down, pine or spruce should have a 
light coat of shellac for a completing operation, to give a slight gloss. 

Doors must be of soft wood, and such finishing will be very appro- 
priate for them, where the standing finish is of harder material. In the 
more elaborate buildings, the pine doors are veneered with hard wood to 
match the other finish, but this adds to the expense. To make a solid 
hard wood door which will not warp is possible, but very difficult. 

Wainscoting should be panelled. If made only 2 feet high, which is 
the proper height at the ends of the room where blackboards are to be set 
above it, with panels 12 inches high and 4 to 8 feet long, the cost will be 
very little greater than that of vertical matched sheathing and the effect 
in every way better. The joints of sheathing shrink unequally, even 
when half of them are not mere imitations, and the work begins to look 
ragged and cheap almost as soon as finished, while the seams afford 
harbor for insects. Under the windows the wainscot will look best to be 
the whole height from floor to window sill, 4 feet, but this may be 

295 



KUEAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



59 



managed with two long panels, one above another, helped out by a bev- 
elled baseboard. (Figs. 51. 52.) For very cheap work the panels may 



FIG. 51. 

be |-inch boards nailed to the wall, and the framing or " stiles," also of 
|-inch pieces, neatly fitted and nailed on top. This is hardly to be 




FIG. 52. 

recommended, but it is better than matched sheathing. With hollow 
walls, when plastered on the brickwork or with the lining wall furred, 
f-inch strips, or grounds, are nailed on before plastering, by driving the 
nails into the joints of the masonry, and the finish is nailed to these. 
294 



'60 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



Where the lining - wall is exposed, grounds may be used, but it is better 
to fit the woodwork close against the brick, driving the nails into the 
mortar joints directly or into wedges of wood previously forced into the 
joints. In any case where woodwork is to be set against masonry, 
whether plastered or not, it is of very great advantage to give it a thick 
coat of paint on the back before putting it up. 

Wainscoting should be finished with a bevel 
or quarter round, which on the side walls may 
form a continuation of the stoolcap moulding 
of the windows. Under the blackboards it 
is common to finish with a moulding either 
shaped out of the solid into a trough on the Fig. 5 4. 
top or supporting a separate one, which may 
be simply a strip of half-inch ,board, inclined 
toward the blackboard. This is to catch chalk 
dust and hold crayons and rubbers. (Figs. 
53, 54.) 

Hallways and vestibules may with advantage also be 

wainscoted in the same simple manner, 3 or 4 feet high. 

Door and window architraves are best very simple. Nothing is 

better or neater in effect than a 




Fig.53. 





/ 



^n 



Fig. 55. 



\ inch board, 4 or 4£ inches wide, 
- bevelled on each edge. The bevel 
may mitre around the top of wain- 
scot. 

When the finish comes against the 
irregular surface of brickwork, in- 
stead of scribing the wood to the 
outline of the brick, trouble may be 
saved by putting the wood on with 
straight back and filling the inter- 
stice with plaster of Paris, colored 
to match the bricks. 

The best blackboards, and the 
cheapest in the end, are of slate. 
These can be had of any slate dealer, 
three-quarters inch thick, with 
smooth rubbed surface, for 30 or 35 
cents a square foot. Such boards 
make little dust, are cleaned by a 
sweep of the rubber, and are ever- 
lasting. 

Among the inferior substitutes the 
best is a brick wall plastered with 
cement mortar, finishing with a surface of clear cement, rubbed down 
when hard with a flat stone and fine sand to a smooth surface, and then 

296 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



61 



coated with any good blackboard 
paint. Ordinary plastering, though 
commonly made use of, is very 
inferior. 

It is best and cheapest to buy the 
blackboard paints put up in cans by 
the school furnishing houses under 
the name of "liquid slating," but an 
imitation may be made by dissolving 
gum shellac in very strong "alcohol, 
95 per cent, at least, and adding fine 
flour of emery, with lampblack, to 
the consistency of thin paint. Three 
coats must be applied. Occasionally 
the last coat of plastering is colored 
by adding lampblack, which must 
first be wet with alcohol or spirits, 
to enable it to be mixed with the 
mortar. When this is done it is well 
to add hydraulic cement to harden 
the surface. Blackboards may be 
finished with a small moulding at the 
top. 




A 



_ze 



Fig. 56. 




A 



a! 



Fig. 57. 



Doors may have a picturesque 
effect given them at small expense 
by the arrangement of the panels, 
and a small stopped chamfer on the 
framing looks well instead of mould- 
iiigs and costs no more. 

Windows should always be double 
hung, with good lines and weights, 
and accurately balanced, so as to 
move with a touch. 

All doors should have locks, of good 
make, and knobs. Thumb latches, 
though cheap, will tear enough 
clothes in the first year to pay the 
extra cost of knobs ten times over. 
Butt hinges for hangin g doors should 
be japanned, unless door and hinges 
are to be painted. A pretty effect 
may be given at small expense by 
having hinges made to spread out 
over the face of the door after the 
fashion of the ancient wrought iron 

297 



62 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 




.ZE 



FIG. 58. 



work. Some care is required in ar- 
ranging butt binges in tbis manner, 
so as to have the knuckle come right 
on both parts, and substitutes, or 
"shams," as they are justly called, 
are sometimes used, consisting of a 
thin plate of some fancy pattern, 
which is screwed on the door close to 
the hinge, which is itself an ordinary 
butt. The plates are thin, fiat cast- 
ings, japanned, with countersunk 
screw holes, and cost a mere trifle. 
The pattern is sawed out of thin 
wood, and the castings of "shams" 
cost but five or six cents each, all 
japanned. With knuckles for real 
hinges, drilled for the pin of the 
butt, the cost is 18 to 25 cents each. 
A few specimens are given (Figs. 55, 
56, 57, 58, 59, 60). 



VENTILATION. 



It should be unnecessary at this 
late day to quote the well worn proofs 
that air loaded with organic contam- 
ination — " school room" air, to give 
it the specific name by which it is 
known in the text books of hygiene 
— is the great source of nervous dis- 
orders and depression of the physi- 
cal powers, of tubercular diseases 
and consumption : every one knows 
them by heart. It is not, however, 
so generally known that children 
are many times more sensitive to 
atmospheric poison than adults, and 
that their natural brightness and 
activity during their school life, in- 
stead of showing that they endure 
its noxious influences with impunity, 
only conceal for the time the disor- 
ganization of lungs or nervous sys- 
tem which will assert itself when it 
is too late to remedy it. 

298 







^r 



FIG. 59, 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE 



63 




Z 



JL 



FIG. 60. 



Those who control the construc- 
tion of the large city school-houses 
are now generally awake to the im- 
portance of ventilation, and efforts 
are made to secure it, with some 
degree of success ; but many country 
school buildings are not only wholly 
destitute of any provision for remov- 
ing foul air, but, being warmed by 
stoves instead of the furnaces of the 
larger structures, no fresh air is ad 
mitted. Others have openings in 
walls or ceilings, wooden shafts per- 
haps, leading into the attic, but with- 
out fresh air inlets or means of per- 
suading the foul air to pass through 
the openings provided for it ; in few 
is there an intelligent comprehension 
of the end to be attained or adapta 
tion of means to that end. Yet small 
school-houses are perhaps the easi- 
est of all buildings to ventilate if the 
object to be secured and the dangers to be avoided are kept in mind. 

Briefly, the aim of ventilation should be to maintain a steady supply 
of fresh air and withdrawal of foul at all parts of the room, removing 
the products of respiration and organic particles as fast as thrown off 
and leaving no corners stagnant or unswept by the purifying current. 

This is to be accomplished primarily by means of the windows, which 
must extend as near the ceiling as possible, so that the air entering by 
them may blow upon and carry away the organic dust and condensed 
vapor which collect upon its surface (when undisturbed) to putrefy and 
diffuse poison through the fresher currents below. The windows should 
be numerous and easily handled, so placed that by means of them a 
thorough draught can be immediately obtained, and, most important of 
all, they must be frequently opened. Nothing can take the place of aera- 
tion by means of open windows. Artificial ventilation, though required 
for changing the air when the windows are necessarily closed, is insuffi- 
cient, even under the best of circumstances, unless the room is from time 
to time thoroughly refreshed and purified by the sweep of the free winds 
through all its windows widely opened. Such an atmospheric washing 
should be secured three or four times daily in all weathers'; at recess, 
particularly, it should be insisted on, banishing teachers and pupils from 
the room meanwhile, if necessary. They will more than make up in 
the brightness of the remaining hours for the time they may thus lose. 
Immediately after school, morning and afternoon, the process should be 

299 



(j-i CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

repeated for a longer time, and just before school, also, if the room can 
be warmed again quickly enough. No fixed transom lights or immova- 
ble arched heads should be permitted to exist over the windows, sub- 
tracting from the most useful portion of the opening ; the large, heavy 
sashes common in the more pretentious buildings should be rehung 
with rawhide cord or copper chain if necessary and pulleys with fric- 
tion rollers balanced so as to move with a touch, while in new buildings 
the size and weight of the sashes should be carefully kept down, no sash 
being over 3 feet wide or If inches thick. Eyes must be fixed to the 
upper sasbes and a pole and hook furnished to handle them with, or r 
still better, cords fastened to each sash hanging within easy reach and 
pulleys to raise or lower them at will, and the window frames must be 
perfectly made, with cherry beads, and looked after from time to time 
to see that all is in working order. 

Besides the general airings in which all the windows are thrown wide 
open it is possible and very desirable during three-fourths of the year 
to keep some of them partly open. If they extend to the ceiling, the 
upper part at least of the south windows, in rooms properly supplied 
with other fresh air inlets, may be pretty widely opened in the coldest 
weather without causing a noticeable draught. Such openings, if on 
the leeward side, often interfere with the action of extraction shafts by 
drawing to themselves the current of escaping air; but this is of no 
importance in the buildings we are considering. 

There are times, however, when windows cannot be opened, and means 
must be provided for insuring the withdrawal of the respired air from 
the room in some other way. 

For our simple structures, it is useless to consider the fan machinery 
for exhaustion and propulsion, by which the uniform passage of' meas- 
ured quantities of fresh air is secured. We must content ourselves; 
with a means less scientific and reliable, but sufficient for our purj>oses: 
the extraction shaft, warmed or not, as the case may be. 

The powers and properties of air shafts are often so grossly misun- 
derstood that an explanation of their action may be necessary before 
proceeding to details. Nothing is more common and more absurd than 
to see rough ventilation flues, 4 by 8 inches, built in walls without any 
provision for heating them, under the supposition that they will 
"draw;" or to see tiny pipes, from the foulest places, introduced into 
chimneys which are cold half the time, in the expectation that the 
"forced draught" which is imagined to exist there will suck up and 
carry off deleterious vapor as fast as a square yard of filth can generate 
it. All talk of "forced ventilation" by means of a shaft without fans 
or steam jets is misleading. The action of every such shaft or chimney, 
warmed or not, is precisely analogous to the movement of two boys 
balanced on a see-saw. If their weight is equal, neither moves ; if one 
is slightly heavier, he descends and the other ascends, but his motion 

300 



RUEAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 65 

would not be fairly described by saying that he was "forced into the 
air." So with ventilating' shafts ; the column of air in them is bal- 
anced against a column of the same size and height outside of them. 
If the outer air is cold and that in the shaft warm, either from artificial 
heat or by communicating with a warm room, the latter column will be 
slightly lighter, because, being expanded, a given volume contains less 
weight. This difference of weight, if there is not too much friction in 
the chimney or elsewhere to be overcome, will incline the balance, and 
the air in the chimney will rise, cold air descending to take its place. 
The actual difference of weight between the column of air in a chimney 
12 inches square and 30 feet high at a temperature of 100° Fahr. and an 
equivalent volume at 32° Fahr. would be 5 ounces ; and this, deducting 
the friction of both the ascending and descending currents, will be the 
measure of the ascensive force of the air in the shaft. 

Without artificial heat the ascensive power is much less — infinites- 
imal often ; and in summer the current in a chimney is at least half the 
time reversed, the evaporation of the hygrometric dampness of the 
masonry cooling the air within it below the temperature of the sur- 
rounding atmosphere. 

This force, feeble though it be, is all we have to depend upon, and it 
need hardly be said that all obstructions to its action must be avoided. 
The common cause of defective action is insufficient fresh air supply. 

The movement of the balance depends wholly on the freedom of action 
of both its sides, and the heated column has no force to spare for suck- 
ing in cold air through inadequate openings to supply the place which, 
it leaves; still less has it the power of going off by itself, leaving a 
vacuum behind ; unless the cold air is ready in equal measure to supply 
its place, the warmer column will wait for it — in other words, stagnate — 
and there will be no draught. This is the condition of most existing 
ventilation flues nine-tenths of the year, as is easily shown by holding a 
light handkerchief before them. 

Vice versa, if fresh air is to be introduced into a room, provision must 
he made for the escape of foul air. The simple experiment of attempt- 
ing to blow into the mouth of a bottle will impress this fact upon the 
mind, and will show why it is that many rooms supplied with hot air 
from furnaces cannot be warmed until a window or other outlet is 
opened, allowing the pent up atmosphere to escape and the fresh supply 
to enter in its place. 

In order, then, that there may be a flow of air through the room, not 
only must the withdrawing shaft be large, straight, and smooth, that 
the inevitable friction of the air upon its walls may not materially ob- 
struct the outward flow, but the inlet openings must be also ample and 
unobstructed, any hindrance to the inward flow being equally a check 
to the outward current. To use a homely illustration, the room to be 
ventilated may be imagined to be traversed by the lower end of a huge 
5 c 1 301 



66 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

atmospheric roller towel. It makes no difference whether we pull one 
side down or the other side up to secure a movement ; but if the towel 
is obstructed in any part of its course the whole is brought to a stand 
still. Becollecting also that to pull down a common roller towel actually 
takes more power than the whole force ordinarily available for moving 
the entire atmosphere of a large room, the total ascensive power of the 
usual ventilating shaft seldom exceeding one or two ounces, the imper- 
ative necessity for avoiding friction will be eyident. 

The principal means to this end is the enlargement of the shafts, the 
friction increasing only directly as the perimeter while the capacity in- 
creases as its square. For this reason a round shaft two feet in diame- 
ter will carry off about as much air as six shafts each one foot in diam- 
eter, and in square pipes the difference is still greater. Besides being 
large, the shaft must be straight, an elbow constituting a very serious 
obstruction ; and it must be round or square, and as smooth as possi- 
ble, to lessen the friction against its walls. 

For the inlets the same precautions are necessary; but the task is 
easier, as they may be short. For the outlet or ascending side of 
the roller, a certain height is needful, as the force increases with the 
length of the warm column ; but the descending side is formed of the 
whole outside air, and only Cubing enough is necessary to introduce 
it into the room. It is, therefore, much easier to provide sufficient 
inlet than outlet. Inlets, however, have a difficulty of their own, that 
is, the necessity for avoiding cold currents or draughts from them, a 
difficulty not to be surmounted without considerable trouble. The best 
way is to introduce warm and cold air together through the same reg- 
isters so as to temper the mixture in winter. How this can be best 
done under varying circumstances will be described in the following 
matter under the head of "Heating." We have now to determine the 
amount of air which should pass through the room in a given time, on 
which depend the size of the outlet and inlet pipes and subsequently 
the modes of inducing a current in these pipes, on which their efficiency 
depends. 

The amount of fresh air which is allowed to hospital patients is about 
2,500 cubic feet each per hour. Criminals in French prisons have to 
content themselves with 1,500 cubic feet per hour. Assuming that we 
care two-thirds as much for the health of our children as we do for 
that of our thieves and murderers, we will make them an allowance of 
1,000 cubic feet each per hour. Forty-eight children will then need an 
hourly supply of 48,000 cubic feet. Definite provision must therefore 
be made for withdrawing this quantity of foul air. No matter how many 
inlets there may be, the fresh air will only enter as fast as the foul es- 
capes, and this can only escape through ducts intended for that purpose, 
porous walls and crevices serving in cool weather only for inward flow. 
What, then, must be the size of the shaft to exhaust 48,000 cubic feet 
per hour f In shafts 2 feet or more in diameter the velocity of the cur- 

302 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 67 

rent varies with the height and with the difference in temperature be- 
tween the atmosphere inside and that outside. In one 20 feet high, 
vertical, and smooth inside, with a difference in temperature of 20 de- 
grees, the velocity will be about 2£ feet per second, or 9,000 feet per 
hour ; that is, it will carry off 9,000 cubic feet of air per hour for every 
square foot of its sectional area. To convey 48,000 cubic feet it must 
have a sectional area of 5^- square feet. 

Such a difference of temperature corresponds to that of the season 
when it is too warm to light the fire and too cold to open the windows, 
and for this season the ventilation should be adapted. 

But in winter, the difference of temperature being much greater, the 
velocity will be increased, and the shaft, especially if warmed artificially, 
will exhaust more than is necessary, if the inlets will supply it. How 
is this to be provided for ? The best way is to open the outlet shaft 
into the room by two registers, one near the floor and the other near the 
ceiling, the net opening of each register b'eing equal to a little more 
than one-half the sectional area of the flue. If iron register fronts are 
employed, each one must be the whole size of the flue. The iron work 
occupying one-third of their area and the obstruction caused by the 
clinging of the air to the surfaces which it passes over deducting also 
from the effective opening, the net capacity of each register so used will 
be about half its superficies. 

With this arrangement, opening both registers gives the full capacity 
of the flue for spring and autumn; in winter, partially or wholly closing 
the upper one reduces the capacity of the outlet in proportion to the 
acceleration of the current. The lower valve should be left always open; 
by this means, when the upper one is closed in cold weather, the greater 
ascensive force or draught at that season is utilized to draw downward 
from the ceiling the fresh warm air which issues from the furnace air 
chambers, and by virtue of its lightness accumulates at the top of the 
room, thus changing the whole atmosphere of the apartment and bring- 
ing the warmer layers down to where they are needed — about the 
bodies of the occupants. During the milder months, there is not power 
enough in the shaft to overcome the inertia of the upper strata of air in 
the room so far as to draw them down to the floor, and if only the lower 
valve is open, even though it be the full size of the shaft, they remain 
stagnant, the shaft supplying itself by a current which sweeps along 
the floor from the nearest inlet. By opening at such times the upper 
valve also, not only is the total capacity of extraction doubled, but the 
air is drawn from top and bottom at once, and thoroughly changed. 

In hot weather the movement through the outlet shaft practically 
ceases ; but at such times the buildings of which we treat will be venti- 
lated by the windows. There are, however, many days in which the 
weather is not warm enough for open windows, yet the motion of the 
air in the " aspiration" shaft is too sluggish for effectual ventilation, even 
with both valves open. For such times artificial means of inducing a 

303 



68 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1830. 

current are valuable, as indeed they are at all seasons, for reenforcing 
the natural draught, feeble at best. When the thermometer in the shaft 
stands at 05° and out of doors at 0°, the difference of 65° represents an 
ascensive force or draught which, when the outer air stands at 50°, 
would require a temperature the whole height of the shaft of 115°, or 
rather more. To raise the air entering from the room at, say, 65° to 
anything near this temperature, which is not far from that of an ordinary 
smoke line, evidently requires some artificial means. The simplest is to 
connect the actual smoke flue from the heating apparatus with the venti- 
lation shaft. Then the air in the latter will be warmed by contact with the 
heated walls of the former. The two flues may be of brick, with a 4-inch 
with between, or the smoke flues may be of metal, carried up inside 
the air shaft. Riveted copper and cast iron pipes are used for this pur- 
pose, and even vitrified or terra cotta drainpipes may be employed. Of 
course, no assistance whatever is derived from these sources unless there 
is a fire in the furnace or stove with which the smoke pipe is connected, 
and, as was said above, the warmer the weather the less will be the nat- 
ural draught and the hotter must be the fire built to aid it. This is 
inconvenient, although in the majority of cases it is the best arrange- 
ment practicable. A more manageable, but more costly, means of arti- 
ficial aspiration consists in the maintenance of a special fire within the 
flue itself, either a grate full of coal or a gas or oil flame. Some such 
motive power is necessary when artificial ventilation is to be carried on 
through the summer; but to be of any use it must be widely different 
from the feeble flames which are so often imagined to be " forcing" a cur- 
rent through an air flue. In summer, with air outside and inside at the 
same point, to cause a withdrawal of 48,000 cubic feet of air per hour, the 
minimum allowance for a room containing 48 children, through a shaft 
2£ feet square inside, will require the consumption of not less than 20 
feet of gas per hour. The cooler the season the greater will be the nat- 
ural draught and the less gas will be needed ; but an expenditure of 
half that amount is out of the question for school purposes, and less 
than this would be merely delusive. So with the steam coils which are 
often introduced : in the .majority of cases the obstruction which their 
bulk presents to the current is at least equivalent to the assistance de- 
rived from their heating qualities. 

A partial exception should be made in favor of a system of aspira- 
tion, applied by Mr. Henry A. Gouge, 47 Beekman street, New York, 
and covered by his patents, so that application must be made to him for 
license to use it. The principle on which this depends is illustrated by 
the following experiment : Blow through a small tube toward a candle 
flame at a distance ; it will be feebly affected. Blow in the same manner 
through a larger tube; the effort will be dispersed and lost. Again, 
blow through both tubes, holding the end of the small one a little way 
within the other — experiment will show the proper distance — the candle 
will be strongly affected, the current through the lesser pipe seeming to 

304 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 69 

be reenforced by an induced current entering at the open end of the 
large one. 

In applying this principle to the ventilation of rooms, the main ex- 
traction shaft of the size required is cut off at a certain point, leaving 
the lower end open. A smaller metal pipe, five or six inches square, is 
inserted a little way into this open end, and at the bottom of the small 
pipe is placed a lamp or gas-jet. The strong though slender current, 
produced by the flame burning in so confined a space, passing quickly 
upward into the mouth of the large shaft, induces in this shaft a move- 
ment of the air greater than would be effected by the same expenditure 
of fuel in the ordinary way. 

Some one of these means of maintaining a current may be very useful 
under certain circumstances. In ordinary cases such quickening of the 
draught in the air shaft as is afforded by connecting it with the smoke- 
flue is, combined with thorough aud frequent airing by open windows, 
all that can be attempted. There will be damp days in spring and 
autumn when this is ineffectual, but, if outlets and inlets are large 
enough and unobstructed, such days will not be numerous. 

The shafts must, however, be tight to be of much use. The wooden 
ducts, so commonly employed, warp and crack, retarding the current 
by the escape and diffusion of the air. The upper register must also 
close tightly, or it will be impossible to draw the warm air down to the 
lower one for winter ventilation. Wooden sliding or hinged shutters 
can be made pretty close, but metal registers and valves are better. 
Those made by W. G. Creamer & Co., 96 John street, New York, have 
a lip on the valves, which assists tight closing. 

Besides the ventilation of the school room proper, it is of great use to 
provide for the discharge of the intensely heated air which in summer 
collects under the roof. The general rule applies here, that without 
inlet there will be no outflow, so that two or more openings must be 
made. The most effectual plan is to construct an open ventilator at 
the highest part of the roof, and leave openings between the feet of the 
rafters all around. This effectually clears the roof space of hot air, the 
movement being stronger as the heat of the sun is greater. Another 
less thorough way consists in makiug openings, protected by blind-slats, 
at two points in the roof, in gables or dormers. If the wind is favorable, 
the air is by this means slowly changed. 

Special ventilation is often needed for particular points, as wardrobes, 
water closets, &c. For these it is generally sufficient to bear in mind 
the rule that without both inlet and outlet of about equal capacity there 
will be no effective current; with them, the days are few in.which there 
will not be some change of air, though it may be slow. 

It is not absolutely necessary that the outlet shaft should be vertical. 
In some cases, where it is difficult to carry up a flue, tubes carried hori- 
zontally in two different directions to the outside of the building will 

305 



70 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



work well. The wind pressure being never the same at the month of 
both tubes, air will enter through one and flow out through the other. 




The ventilation of privy vaults is treated of below under " Sani- 
tation." 

It is a disputed point whether the galvanized iron caps, of which so 
many forms are sold, assist the action of ventilating flues. That they 
do not in practice accelerate the current is made certain by rigid tests 
of many varieties, but they do not materially obstruct it, and the best 
will generally but not always prevent down draughts where the flue is 
situated near a higher roof or a hill. 

HEATING. 

Shall the school room be heated by shutting out all fresh air, starting 
an air tight stove or a steam radiator, and parboiling the bodies and 
brains of the children in an unchanged atmosphere reeking with carbonic 
acid and organic exhalations'? This will save fuel, but waste life. 
Fresh air must be admitted at any cost. How is the fresh air to be intro- 
duced, cold from the outside or warmed in transitu ? If it enters cold, 
those nearest the inlet will suffer from the chilling draught. Unques- 
tionably it must be warmed before it enters the room. 

Then the problem of heating is solved ; 48,000 cubic feet of fresh air 
per hour, the minimum allowance for a school of 48 children, must be 
raised from the out-of-door temperature to 70° and discharged into the 
room. Any heating apparatus which will do this is suitable, and none 
is suitable which will not. 

In practice, heating stoves or furnaces raise a comparatively small 

306 



RUEAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



71 



amount of air, that which actually comes in contact with their radiating sur- 
faces, to a temperature of 100° to 200°, and this is subsequently mixed 
with a sufficient quantity of cool air to give an average atmosphere at 
70°. There is nothing objectionable in this, provided the warmer com- 
ponent is not so heated as to char and decompose the dust floating in it, 
and provided also that the cool portion of the mixture is derived fresh 
from out of doors, and is not simply the foul air of the room, which has 
been cooled by stagnation, and, drifting near the furnace register, is 
caught up and sent into renewed circulation. This will be the case 
unless supplies both of hot and cold air are introduced together from out 
of doors in such a way that if the current from the register is too warm 
it may be tempered by increasing the proportion of fresh cold air in the 
mixture at the same time that the proportion of warm air is diminished ; 
not, as is the ordinary arrangement, by shutting the register, and thus 
cutting off all supply of fresh air of any kind. With such a system, keep- 
ing the admission of fresh air the same at all times, regulating its tem- 
perature by varying the proportion of its two component parts, supple- 
mented by suitable shafts for withdrawal of foul air, winter heating and 
ventilation are easily managed. 




Fig. 62. 



Fig. 62 shows a suitable device for effecting this mixture of warm and 
cold fresh air in the register box of an ordinary furnace, but there are 
many other ways. 

307 



72 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

The register box is sh own in section : H is the usual tin pipe from 
the hot air chamber of the furnace. C is a similar cold air pipe leading 
from out of doors or from the cold air box of the furnace. The pipe C 
ma}' be introduced either below or at the side. 

So far, there is no difference between this and an ordinary register 
box. To apply the regulating valve, strips of tin are soldered to tbe 
sides of the box, with a low partition through the middle, and to this 
fixed partition is hinged a tin flap, stiffened by wiring the edges. Noth- 
ing more is needed but to take out the valves of an ordinary register 
and arrange the button by a short wire lever to act upon the flap. 

To diffuse the hot and cold air, wire gauze may be put over the in- 
clined mouth of each division and a sheet of the same may be spread 
under the register plate itself. This will mix the two currents and prevent 
unpleasant draughts, and the size of the registers may easily be made 
larger to compensate for the obstruction to the flow so caused. 

This disposition of registers is practicable with any form of basement 
furnace. Where the room is warmed by stoves a different arrange- 
ment is necessary, the principle of which was explained by Franklin a 
century ago, and consists simply in bringing cold fresh air from out of 
doors by a duct which directs it against the radiating surface of the 
stove, from which it passes warmed into the room. An application of 
this principle may be made with any common stove by carrying a tin or 
wooden pipe from the outer air to a point beneath it, and directing it 
upward through a hole in the floor under the stove. A part will come in 
contact with the hot iron and be warmed, while the rest escapes un- 
changed, but the whole will be pure. An improvement on this consists 
•of a galvanized iron or zinc casing around the stove, by which the in- 
coming air is held longer in contact with it and more thoroughly warmed. 
These, however, are wasteful make shifts. The "school stoves," of which 
many kinds are manufactured, accomplish the same end far more econom- 
ically and thoroughly. 

Figure 63 shows the construction of that made by Mr. John Gros- 
sius, 389 Main street, Cincinnati, Ohio, the direction of the pure air 
from outside within the casing and on the hot surface to its escape 
through the open top being easily seen. It is in fact a small hot air 
furnace. Similar ones are sold by the New England School Furnishing 
Company, Boston; A. Lotze's Sons, Cincinnati; L. W. Leeds, New 
York, and many other parties. 

Another heater much used in schools is the so called Fire on the 
Hearth stove, made by the Open Stove Ventilating Company, 78 Beek- 
man street, New York, which differs from the preceding mainly in having 
an open front, so that it can be used either as an air tight stove or an open 
fire. Where it can stand at a distance sufficient to prevent scorching 
the faces of the scholars, the open fire quality is very desirable. The 
radiation from the mass of coals warms the floor and the feet of the 
children in front, and the ventilation afforded by the draught of the fire 

308 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



73 



WATER BOWL 



HOT AIR 



HOT AIR 




FIG. 63. 



309 



74 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



is very considerable. Indeed, many small school-houses are warmed 
and ventilated wholly by means of one of these stoves with the front 
open, the fresh air supply entering beneath, being warmed in its passage 
through the casing, and issuing at the top, whence it rises to the ceiling, 
circulates through the room, and becoming cool and foul at the same 
time, settles to the floor, is drawn in at the grate, and escapes up the 
chimney. This is perfect in principle, and is very much better than no 
ventilation at all, but is inadequate to the needs of forty or fifty children. 
With the blower on and closed, this stove affords no ventilation worth 
mentioning, unless a separate exhaust shaft is provided to draw off after 
vitiation the fresh air which it furnishes, and thus allow more to come in. 

The same is the case with 
the other heaters described. 
An improvement might 
easily be made in these 
stoves by arranging registers 
in such a way that the incom- 
ing air should be thrown into 
the room after a longer or 
shorter contact with the hot 
surface, at pleasure. Under 
the present arrangement the 
^temperature of the room is 
regulated by quickening or 
slackening the fire, a com- 
paratively slow process; by 
the improvement we propose 
it could be changed in a few 
minutes. 

A few practical sugges- 
tions on the management of 
stoves and furnaces may be 
kept in mind. 

Difficulty is sometimes 
found in directing the hot 
air supplied from the regis- 
ters to the desired points. 
The school stoves, particu- 
larly in a high room, send the 
warm air directly up to the 
ceiling, and the lower part of 
the room must wait until the 
upper regions are complete- 
ly filled before it can enjoy 
the heat. The Fire on the 
Hearth stove obviates this 

310 




EURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 75 

difficulty to a great extent by its powerful draught, which immediately 
sets up a circulation from the upper strata to those nearest the floor, and 
a good ventilating shaft with the lower register only open accomplishes 
the same result ; but a still more speedy effect may be obtained by sus- 
pending a shallow screen of sheet-metal over the stove, by which the as- 
cending current is directed outward and downward so as to reach the 
occupants of the room at once, becoming also thoroughly intermingled 
with the general body of air. The Boston school stoves (Fig. 64) are 
made with this appendage, which can be easily added to any form of 
apparatus. Furnace registers often need similar screens to direct their 
current toward or away from any particular point. 

It is much disputed whether furnace registers should be in walls or 
floor, or, if in the wall, at what height. For large buildings with strong 
ventilation the best position seems to be in the wall, 6 feet or so above 
the floor. Then the current warms to some extent the lower strata of 
the atmosphere of the room, without blowing directly upon any one, and 
the tendency of the hot air to collect at the ceiling is counteracted by 
the draught toward the lower register of the ventilating shaft. 

Where the ventilation is as feeble as it will generally be without fans 
or special sources of heat in the shaft, this tendency of the hot current 
to rise out of reach cannot be overcome, and although the fresh warm 
air, like an inverted lake filling up from below, finally reaches the occu- 
pants of the room, much of its heat is wasted in warming the ceiling, 
so that for such cases, which include most small buildings, the best po- 
sition for registers will be either low in the wall, and directed so that 
the strong horizontal current from them will not annoy any one, or in 
the floor, where the natural disposition of the air to rise is counteracted 
by its clinging to the floor, along which it travels horizontally a consid- 
erable distance before leaving it to ascend to the upper regions. Floor 
registers are liable to gather dust ; they must be kept clean. 

An inconvenient breeze from a register, either hot or cold, may be 
lessened without diminishing the supply of air, by widening the box or 
pipe in trumpet shape, with the mouth toward the exit, and putting on 
a larger register plate. Wire gauze either over or under the register 
will also do much to diffuse the current gently. 

Furnaces should be set under the northwest corner of the building, 
and registers may be placed in the four angles ; the greater length of 
pipe needed to reach the southern registers, and the consequent obstruc- 
tion by friction, will be compensated by the natural circulation of the 
air in the room, upward on the sunny side and downward on the cold 
side, so that the delivery will be uniform at all the registers, which it 
will not be if the furnace is centrally placed. Stoves also heat more 
equally if set in the coldest corner. 

Eegisters and the so called ventilating stoves should not be situated 
so near the opening of the ventilating shaft that the air from them will 
be drawn into the shaft as fast as delivered. The best position is at the 

311 



76 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



same end of the room as the shaft, but at one side. Then, the lower 
inlet only of the shaft being open, the upward tendency of the warm, 
fresh air from the heater will carry it up out of reach before it can be 
drawn laterally far enough to enter the shaft. It will then move along 
the ceiling to the further end of the room, descend to the floor by cool- 
ing, and be drawn back into the ventilator only after a circulation 
through the room more extended and thorough than could be attained 
with any other relative position of outlet and inlet. 

A serious difficulty is often experienced, both with basement furnaces 
and ventilating stoves, through the action of the wind on the exterior 
opening of the cold air box or other fresh air supply. It is customary to 
direct these toward the north or northwest, and the result is that with 
a high wind from that quarter the air is driven through the air cham- 
ber of the furnace and up through the registers much faster than it can 
be warmed. 

The usual remedy is to close the damper in the air box, so that the 
sectional area of the inward current shall be diminished in proportion 
to its 'ncreased velocity. If the air box were tight and the wind 
steady this would be correct, but in practice the wind comes in puffs, 
to guard against which the damper is too much closed, and the normal 
supply of air being thus curtailed the furnace, to make up the deficiency, 
draws from the cellar, through the cracks and pores of the air chamber 
and box, such air as it can find. 

If, on the contrary, the sheltered side of the building is chosen for 
taking in fresh air supply, a strong wind from the opposite quarter will 
create a vacuum on the lee side of the house strong enough to reverse 
the natural current, and draw air out of the building through the reg- 



Main Fresh Air Box 




Fig. 65. 



isters and air chamber of the furnace, the warm air issuing at the orifice 
where the cold should go in. This is not a rare occurrence, and cannot 
be remedied without some trouble. 

312 



KUEAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 77 

To obviate both these difficulties and insure a steady and sufficient 
supply to the stove or furnace at all times, it is only necessary to carry 
the cold air box through the building, with orifices at each end; the 
furnace is then supplied by means of a short pipe, drawing from the 
side of the main box at right angles with it. (Fig. 65.) The wind may 
then blow through the main box at will -without disturbing the fur- 
nace, which takes from the stream just what it needs and no more. 
Where several registers are to be supplied with cold fresh air for mixing 
with warm, a similar large main box, tapped at right angles by the 
minor pipes, forms much the best arrangement. 

If the force of the wind still makes itself felt in the rooms, a further 
check may be found in a screen made of two thicknesses of wire gauze, 
with wool loosely picked and spread between them. Independent of its 
use for checking the force of the current, this " air filter " is valuable for 
straining out dust and soot where the fresh air supply is unavoidably 
taken from a street or other dusty place. 

There is much controversy as to the relative merits of cast and 
wrought iron furnaces. As a rule, more science has been expended on 
the cast iron varieties and they radiate better and are more economical 
of fuel than the plate iron forms, which are often nothing more than a 
simple cylinder inverted over the grate; but it is probable that furnace 
joints soon become pervious to carbonic oxide gas, and plate iron forms 
the most reliable security against the mixing of the air with minute 
quantities of atmospheric poison. 

The qualities to be sought for in wrought iron as well as in cast fur- 
naces are tight joints, strength of metal, and the greatest possible ex- 
tent of radiating surface. The greater the surface the more thoroughly 
the air will be warmed, such a furnace discharging large volumes of air 
all at a moderate temperature, while one with small radiating surface 
sends out a mixture of much cold with a small quantity of highly heated 
air. 

Among the appliances for regulating furnaces, the automatic heat 
governors should be mentioned. These, by means of the expansion or 
contraction of rods passing through the air chamber, act upon the check 
draught damper and the lower door of the furnace, increasing the fire 
when the temperature in the air chamber falls and checking it when it 
rises, either by a change in the weather or by the closing of registers 
above. For so simple and inexpensive an apparatus ($15) it is singu- 
larly useful. 

In many cases open fireplaces will be used* in preference to any kind 
of stove. There is a very mistaken idea that any room with an open 
fireplace is sufficiently ventilated, summer and winter, without further 
apparatus. In winter, it is true, the chimney may be used as an ex- 
haust shaft, so far as its capacity extends, and its action will be increased 
by the heat of the fire at its foot, but its usefulness depends much on 
the provision of suitable inlets of fresh air. In warmer weather the im- 

313 



78 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



FRESH AIR 



ROOM 



pure air collects at the top of the room, and the difference in tempera- 
ture between the atmosphere within and that without is too small to set 
up a current capable of drawing down the stagnant upper strata to the 
floor. 

Even if the capacity of the flue should be sufficient for winter venti- 
lation, a separate shaft with. an opening at the top is required for spring 
and fall. The once 
common practice of 
putting a register in 
the smoke flue, near 
the top of the room, 
sometimes with but 
oftener without light 
valves held open by 
a spring, but blow- 
ing to with any down 
draught, is too dan- 
gerous to be counte- 
nanced. The valves, 
if used, may rust and 
stick, and such open- 
ings have been 
known to give vent 
suddenly to sheets of 
flame. 

The fresh air inlets, 
wherever open fires 
are used, must be 
ample and so placed 
that their current will 
not annoy the occu- 
pants of the room. 
Usually, no special 
inlet is provided, and C0LD FRESH 
the fire takes its air 
where it can find it, 
sucking it in in small 
streams through the 
crevices of doors and 
windows, walls and 
floors. These small 
draughts of cold air, 
drawn directly from 
out of doors and 
crossing the room 
straight to the fire, 
314 




RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 79 

are both uncomfortable and dangerous. A sufficient supply should be 
specially provided ; then these secondary currents will cease. The best 
way to obtain this supply is by means of a flue passing through or near 
the fireplace, with an opening at the bottom to the exterior air and 
another into the room, if possible above the mantel, so that the fresh 
air, thus warmed, may not be drawn directly into the fireplace but may 
rise to the ceiling and circulate through the room until sufficiently cooled 
to descend to the floor, be drawn back to the fire, and consumed or 
.driven off up the chimney. There are endless ways of effecting this ; 
any intelligent mason can accomplish it. One way is to build a false 
back to the fire place, carrying flues from it to the front of the breast 
(Fig. 66) above the mantel. These cross flues may be made of brick, or 
bits of drain pipe can be built in. The heat around them and against 
the false back warms the air effectually. Still better would be a similar 
apparatus of iron, but the materials may not be at hand, and a large Fire 
on the Hearth stove would answer the same purpose better at less ex- 
pense. Even the roughest chimney may have a similar flue built up at 
the side instead of the back, with opening in the side of the breast and 
an opening to the external air at the bottom. (Fig. 67.) The air will be 
less easily warmed than where the partition is of brick or iron, but to 
compensate for this the fires in such rough chimneys are likely to be 
made without sparing fuel. 

The homely buildings in which pebble stone or log chimneys are used 
will be particularly benefited by such an air supply flue ; not that they 
lack ventilation, but because their seams and cracks, from the moment 
that the fire discovers an easier source of supply, will cease to admit cold 
draughts. If the flue for fresh warmed air is large enough (it should 
be considerably larger than the smoke flue), the pressure at the crevices 
around the walls will be rather outward than inward. 

SANITATION. 

If the principles ot ventilation, heating, location, and construction, as 
described in the foregoing pages, are intelligently applied to school build- 
ings, little more can be done to preserve the health of their inmates, and 
if any of them are neglected no amount of attention to the others will 
make amends. 

The importance of guarding the water supply of the school from con- 
tamination has already been dwelt upon, and frequent inspection of the 
ground whence are derived the springs which feed the well should pre- 
vent subsequent defilement. 

In the building itself, the imperative necessity for preserving the cel- 
lar air clean and sweet must never be forgotten ; basement laboratories 
or storerooms for chemicals, kerosene, or even coal and wood, should be 
avoided. If these precautions are observed, the only probable remain- 
ing source of impurity will be the sinks or bowls and closets. Of these 
the bowls will give no trouble if drained into a separate "dry well," 

315 



80 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



consisting of a pit some 2 or 3 barrels in capacity, filled with loose 
stones and sodded over, or still better a line of 50 to 100 feet of sole 
tile, laid end to end, about a foot below the surface of the ground, and 

Fig. 6" 




EUEAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



81 



the joints covered with a bit of paper or handful of hay before filling 
up the trench. The water discharged from the school washbowls is 
comparatively so clean that there is hardly a possibility of the outlet 
choking with sediment. It is otherwise with the water closet drainage, 
which will in time fill up the pores of any soil. The usual course, to 
postpone as long* as possible the evil day when the cesspool must be 
cleaned out, by making it of great size, is unwise. Aside from the in- 
creased cost, the large accumulation of material is at all times much 
more offensive and dangerous than a small one, and the cleaning out, 
when it comes, is horrible, while the pumping out of a small reservoir once 
a week or so is not a serious matter. The best cesspool is a tight tank 
of brickwork in cement, with brick or concrete bottom and a stone top 
set in cement. The stone cover may, with advantage, have a common 
iron pump fixed in it, by means of which the contents of the tank may 
be pumped out whenever required with the least trouble. 

In addition, the cesspool cover should be drilled with a number of 
holes for admission of air. If the tank is far from the building, it is 
best to put a trap in the drain pipe, near the house wall. In this case, 
there will be a constant small effluvium from the cesspool, but, unless it 
is too large, not enough to reach the building. If space is restricted, 
the drain pipe should be without a trap and the soil pipes carried well 
up above the roof. Then the natural warmth of soil pipes and cesspool 
will cause an upward flow in the now unobstructed line of pipe, the air 
being drawn in through the holes in the stone cover instead of issuing 
therefrom, and will be discharged harmlessly into the upper air. 

An overflow is usually necessary to any tight cesspool which is in 
danger of being neglected. This may be carried to a small dry well or 
other outlet, where its offensiveness will do as little harm as possible. 

In many places these dry wells or leaching cesspools will for economy's 
sake be employed to do the whole work, regardless of the gradual pois- 
oning of the subsoil inseparable from their use. Even in this case, it is 
well to remember that a small 
brick tank for first receiving 
the drainage and allowing it 
to settle and dissolve is of much 
value in preventing the clogg- 
ing of the soil around the leach- 
ing pit. 

The overflow pipe should be 
built into the wall about half 
its diameter below the inlet 
pipe, and a quarter bend should 
be previously cemented in, so 
that when set this will dip 
below the surface of the liquid 
in the cesspool. (Fig. 68.) By this means, the scum and paper which 
6 c I 317 













Fig.68. 


CESSPOOU 




«— \ 






/V 




j i /f^- 






•= \\ -(h 






if — — I] 




















— 







82 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

always float on the top will be prevented from entering and choking the 
overflow pipe. 

The drain pipe should be of vitrified earthenware outside the building, 
jointed with cement and the joints scraped out clean. Inside or under 
the house nothing should be used but cast iron of the best possible make 
and jointed with melted lead. Four pounds of lead is not too much for 
each joint in a four-inch pipe, and it must be well caulked in. This soil 
pipe must be carried well up above the roof, and the end left open. If 
this is not done, the flow of water through the traps will at times siphon 
them out, leaving free communication between the house and the interior 
of the drain, and any expansion in hot weather of the air contained in 
the soil pipe will force bubbles through the traps to contaminate the 
atmosphere of the rooms. 

These points being properly arranged, there will be, with good water 
closets, well set, nothing to fear from the plumbing. With plenty of 
water, the best closets are the enamelled hoppers with enamelled traps, 
supplied automatically by a tank with siphon or " tumbler," so as to flush 
all the closets once in ten minutes through the day. This is also an 
economical arrangement, as one tank will supply a number of closets, 
but consumes much water. Next in cleanliness as well as in consump- 
tion of water come the Jennings and Demarest closets, then the Hellyer, 
American Defiance, Climax, and Whirlpool varieties j last, the common 
pan closets. Hoppers without abundant, and if possible automatic, 
flushing are liable to become nuisances. 

The evils of pan closets are much mitigated by using only those with 
enamelled receivers, but, common as they are, none remain long free from 
offense. All the varieties may be arranged for automatic action, the 
valves being operated by the opening and shutting of the door or press- 
ure on the seat, and this is strongly to be recommended. 

Many large schools use the latrines made by J. L. Mott & Co., New 
York, and others, which consist of a long trough filled with water, which 
is emptied and flushed two or three times daily by a janitor or servant. 
These are useful, but hardly suitable for small schools. 

In general, whatever plumbing is used should be of the best and most 
thorough kind. A country-built house with country plumbing is apt 
to be a dangerous place to inhabit, and school houses and public build- 
ings are even worse. 

Urinals become exceedingly offensive unless well looked after. 
Wherever possible, they should have floor and partitions of slate or 
marble, for easy washing, and should in any case be in a well aired place. 
A piece of common bar soap is often placed in urinals to lessen the 
odor from them and is of considerable use. 

Earth closets, which will in the majority of cases form the most avail- 
able appliance, differ only from a well arranged privy in the fittings by 
which at intervals a small quantity of sifted dry earth is thrown on the 
matter in the vault. A very small quantity, if evenly spread, acts as 
318 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



83 



a complete disinfectant, and earth closets are nearly as free from offense 
as the best water closets — much more so than inferior ones — with the 
advantages of simplicity, cheapness, and availability in cold weather. 

The simpler the apparatus the better; those for house use often come 
provided with springs for automatic sprinkling of the earth, slides to 



Wire 



SUPPLYING 
EARTH 



Section of Earth Closet 

showing position of 

valve when at rest. 




enclose the receptacle when not in use, &c, all of which are best dis- 
pensed with in schools. Not knowing of any ready made appliance 
exactly suited to the mode of treatment which he proposes, the writer 
suggests the following, which works well in the model at least. 

What is needed is a capacious reservoir for the dried earth, a measurer 
to receive from the reservoir a certain small quantity, and a means of 

319 



84 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



throwing out the earth contained in the measurer at will in a uniform 
sheet over the vault, after which operation another given dose should 
fall into the measurer, to be ready for the next operation. 

In Figs. 69 and 70 the reservoir or hopper is filled with a shovel from 
the outside through the opening. A lid of plain boards is hinged to the 



Wire 



Fig.70. 



Section of Earth Closet 
Showing valve in action. 




back of the hopper. Fig. 69 shows it at rest, the weight of the earth 
holding the lid back and the opening being closed by a slide. By push- 
ing in a lever, pulling a cord, or other means, the inverted lid is thrown 

320 



BUBAL SCHOOL AECHITECTUBE. 85 

forward, as shown in Fig. 70, and the slide raised, shutting off the de- 
scent of earth from the hopper above into the measurer, but throwing the 
portion already contained in it over the vault in a uniform sheet. On 
the relaxing of the impulse the weight draws the slide back and sup- 
plies the measurer with a fresh dose. By regulating the front edge of 
the measurer the sheet of earth may be directed as required. BBBis 
a sheet of wire netting fixed in the hopper, which serves to sift the earth 
and to prevent it from packing so firmly in the bottom as to impede 
the movement of the measurer. The jar communicated to the apparatus 
shakes down the earth, a matter of some importance. Very possibly 
there may be better modes of accomplishing the same result ; the writer 
merely suggests this as illustrating the end to be attained and the sim- 
plicity of means desirable. 

A separate box may be fitted to every seat, or one may serve for two 
or three. Perhaps the best means for discharging the earth will be 
by cords under the supervision of the teacher. 

The vault may, with advantage, consist of tight plank boxes on wheels, 
so as to be easily rolled out for emptying. If this is impracticable, a 
shallow pit lined with 8-inch brickwork in cement, and with bottom of 
bricks on edge, also laid in cement, is necessary, and for facility of clean- 
ing the bottom may slope outward. The vault should be accessible from 
the outside, but closed by strong and tight doors with lock and key. 

The earth used in these closets should be loam or clay, not sand. It 
should be dried in the sun or by a fire, sifted, and stored in a dry place. 
The screen for sifting should have about three meshes to the inch ; and 
coal ashes, similarly sifted, may be added to the mixture in quantity 
equal to the earth without harm. Wood ashes or lime should not be 
used. 

The earth taken out of the vaults may be dried and used over again 
indefinitely. It retains no trace of the organic matter which it has 
helped to decompose. The quantity required may be easily calculated. 
About 1£ pints, or 2 J pounds, of average earth per closet will generally 
be enough for each discharge, supposing these to take place four or five 
times daily; and the capacity of the reservoir divided by this will give 
the length of the interval between successive fillings. If several relays 
of earth are dried and stored in barrels, there need be no interruption to 
the working of the apparatus. 

A privy is simply an earth closet without the disinfecting earth, and 
needs no further description. The vault should be small, built of brick 
in cement, with brick bottom sloping toward the rear, and tight door for 
cleaning out, as described above. In addition, the vault should be pro- 
vided with a ventilating pipe, carried up well above the roof. This is best 
of galvanized iron, but may be of wood if perfectly tight. The doors 
opening into the vault should be made tight with list or weather mould- 
ing, and all crevices cemented up. If this is thoroughly done, there 
will be a pretty constant current of air downward through the seats, 

321 



86 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR IrttiO. 



thence up through the shaft into the atmosphere, and no odor will be 
perceived even directly over the seat. The top of the ventilating shaft 
should be protected by a cap if higher roofs about it are likely to cause 
down draughts. Unless the vault is tight, no ventilation will prevent 
stench from the saturated soil around it. 

ACOUSTICS. 

The dimensions of school-rooms are generally fixed by other consid- 
erations, but some attention may be paid to acoustic quality without 
detriment to the other uses of the building. 

The most common mistake is in making the room too high. Any- 
thing over 13 feet is likely in a room not over 40 feet square to cause 
that confusion of sounds and echoes which constitutes what is called a 
"noisy" room. Twelve feet is still better as" to this point. Painted or 
impervious walls also promote echo and noisiness, and the dampness of 
fresh plaster, closing its pores like paint, often causes the same unpleas- 
ant effect, which however disappears as the wall dries out. 

Little can be done to cure such a room, if originally wrongly pro- 
portioned, except putting in a new ceiling hung below the old. 

Occasionally echoes from the blank end walls may annoy teachers or 
scholars. Something may be done to remedy this by hanging maps or 
any soft elastic substance against the offending wall. If desks are 
placed next the side walls, which should 
never be the case, there is very likely to 
an indistinctness of sound there, from thej: 
intermingling of sound waves transmitted 
at different velocities through the air and 
along the solid substance and reflected from ; 
the rear. This can be partly remedied by 
cutting off the rear angles of the room by 
a board set in the corner, as at X; but the 
desks should be moved away from the walls. 
(Fig. 71.) • 

ATTRACTIVENESS AND ECONOMY IN BUILDING. 

These two qualities are perhaps not altogether compatible, at least 
not in their highest development ; but it is rare to find any building 
which does not show some sacrifice to appearance, and with care and 
knowledge little expenditure is needed to secure some measure of pict- 
uresque beauty. For this, however, the first requisite is good construc- 
tion. Elaboration of detail only adds to the repulsiveness of a structure 
tainted with premature decay. To begin with frame structures, all 
woodwork should be kept from contact with earth, and even when 
brought into juxtaposition with masonry should be well painted to repel 
the inevitable dampness. The end grain of timber needs most to be 
protected, and the tenons of beams framed into girders* The end joints 

322 




RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



87 



of clapboards, especially where they abut against a casings or corner 
boards and all similar points, may with great advantage be coated 
with paint before the parts are brought together. This will prevent the 
springing out of clapboards or siding at ends through the breaking 
away by incipient rotting of the wood around the nails in those places, 
which soon disfigures buildings not well cared for. In the same way, 
plank walks and outside woodwork will keep in good condition much 
longer if the ends of the planks are painted. 

Another important though commonly neglected point is the use of 
galvanized nails for putting on clapboards and outside finish. The 
usual way is to employ ordinary nails and "set in" the heads far enough 
to allow a little putty to be daubed over them before painting the second 
coat. This keeps the water out till the builder gets his pay. Soon after- 
wards the continual shrinking and swelling of the boards by the vicis- 
situdes of weather open a little crack around the putty, through which 
moisture penetrates, to exude again, leaving a rusty streak below every 
nail hole. In dwelling-houses painted every five years or so, this is less 
important, but neglect must be assumed to be the normal condition of 
school-houses, and its evil effects must be provided against so far as prac- 
ticable in the first place. 

All other points of strength and quality of material should be well 
looked after. Gutter irons should not be over 30 inches apart ; shingles 
should not show more than one-third their length to the weather; clap- 
boards 6 inches wide should lap at least 1 J inches ; the tops of door and 




window casings should be rebated or flashed with sheet lead to prevent 
the entry of water over them ; door and window stools should pitch 
sharply to throw water quickly off; and, as a rule, eaves should have 
considerable projection, a matter of importance in promoting the dryness 
of the building. 

323 



88 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



It is very common to dispense with gutters in small rural buildings; 
but the constant dripping of eaves without them wears away the grass 
in an irregular and untidy line around the edifice. 

If the construction is judicious and the materials are good and used with 
due regard to their properties, not trying to bend straight clapboards 
around circular projections or to glue up narrow boards into fictitious 
panels of immoderate size, little is necessary to satisfy the eye at least. 
By painting in a variety of tints, a wide field is opened for giving inter- 
est to the plainest structure. 




FIG. 73. 

To begin with the most humble efforts at color decoration, a pleasant 
harmony may be obtained by leaving the shingles and siding boards of 
a frame structure unpainted, covering only the corner boards and u finish" 
with light red. The mineral reds , 
answer well, if brightened with yel- 
low ochre, and are cheap. Doors 
should have red panels and un- 
painted stiles, or vice versa. Where 
the windows are numerous and the] 
finish work forms a comparatively i 
large proportion of the surface,! 
great picturesqueness may be given ! 
by painting the siding, leaving cas- ; 
ings, corner boards, belts, and roof j 
plain. (Pig. 72.) The harmony of i 
gray and pink or rose color, which! 
a few months of weathering gives 
the work, is peculiarly pleasant 
when treated in the latter mode. 

In order to manage the color 
effect nicely with any combination 

324 




FIG. 74. 



EURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



89 



of tints, it is often desirable to break up a surface which would otherwise 
give too large a mass of one shade by belts or bands in various patterns. 
These may be readily and cheaply made by putting boards directly 




Fig. 75. 

over the shingles or clapboarding. In this way there will be no need of 
"grafting" or flashings, which are necessary where the bands are nailed 
on the under boarding and shingled or clapboarded up to in the com- 
mon way, and the effect is if anything rather in favor of the cheaper 
mode, which gives more projection than the other. Figs. 73, 74, and 75 
give a variety of suggestions. 

A little ingenuity will secure much beauty with two colors, the prin- 
cipal point being to avoid heavy masses of unbroken tint. Every op- 
portunity should be seized for changing from one color to the other, es- 
pecially about porches and balustrades, which demand delicate treat- 
ment. 































































imp 


'inn 








fojhjs.. 




Ki 




unf 


Skji 


w. J 


Skji^^ 




l 


I'JU J 






11 


1 










in 


i 



















Fig. 76. 
It will often be found, however, that the porch detail is too small for 
the rest of the building, which looks heavy and clumsy by contrast. In 



325 



90 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

this case, a corresponding delicacy may be suggested in the main por- 
tion by a narrow belt or two, or a row of shingles with cut ends may be 
carried around it, and the intervals, being painted of a different color, 
will present a chain of colored points, restoring smallness of scale and 
" preciousn'ess " to the whole. (Fig. 76.) 

Where the whole of the outside woodwork is painted, the best effect 
will be found in employing three or four different colors. One of these 
should always in the country be an olive or brownish green, to recall 
and as it were tie the building down to the general surface of grass and 
earth about it. The other tints may be varieties of the same green, 
made by modifying it with blue, yellow, or brown. This, with the roof 
painted a brownish red, using any of the red mineral pigments now in 
the market, will give a pleasant effect, especially if touches of red are 
introduced at different points in the mass of green, as on window sashes, 
brackets, ends of rafters, panel mouldings of doors, turned work, &c. 
If a more lively impression upon the eye is desired the indispensable 
olive green may be boldly associated with the red and violet, which will 
complete the full color scale. 

It is said by some oculists that the retina of the eye is composed of 
three layers of nerve substance, one of which responds to green rays, 
another to red, and the third to violet. White light, in which all the 
rays are contained, calls the whole of the retina into action ; colored 
light, on the contrary, excites only its special layer, leaving the others 
quiescent. Hence it follows that in observing party-colored objects the 
optic nerve is more or less unequally brought into action, and in conse- 
quence unpleasantly affected, according as the proportions of the vari- 
ous hues depart from or approach that proportion which would stimu- 
late the three sensitive layers equally. When this proportion is reached, 
whether by pure colors or subtle mixtures, the eye experiences a sensa- 
tion of rest and satisfaction. This is what is meant by the term " color 
harmony." Just what are the relative proportions and the shades of 
color which constitute perfect harmony we cannot yet say. In general, 
if the three quasi primary colors, red, green, and violet, are presented 
of equal intensity and in equal areas, the eye will be roughly satisfied. 

For our purpose, the violet may be represented by the dark " slate 
paints" sold for putting on roofs, modified by admixture of other pig- 
ments if desired. The green should be of an olive cast and the red may 
be any warm ochrey color not too dark. The red is likely to be the 
most intense of the three ; if so, it must present proportionately less 
surface, and in the same way the area of the other colors must be in 
inverse proportion to their intensity to keep the balance right. Some 
ingenuity will be required in managing the colored surfaces. The roof, 
if it shows about one- third of the total visual area, may be painted with 
the slate color at once. If it shows more, the violet should be lightened 
or modified ; if less, intensified. To divide the red and green equally, 
excuses must be sought for painting gables, for coloring the wall beneath 

326 







Pace page i" 



hi 






t^~ 



'5 Process- 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 91 

a belt differently from that above, showing doors with red panels in 
green framework, and so on. In case of necessity, the red can be so 
intensified with vermilion that its area may be made relatively small. 
Endless combinations will suggest themselves to any one who once un- 
derstands the simple principles from which he should work. 

More complex harmonies may be tried in reserving, say, a portion of 
the green, separating it into blue and yellow, and with these decorating 
prominent points ; or, by keeping the green of a bluish cast, enough 
free yellow, so to speak, will be liberated to enliven gables or similar 
points. It is safest, however, to experiment with the tints rather sub- 
dued. 

Inside the building, decoration must necessarily be restrained. The 
ennobling frescoes of battle scenes and deeds of heroism which some 
wish to see on school room walls are hardly for our day ; the best we 
can hope for will be coarse maps or diagrams. Ceilings should be white, 
for the sake of their reflected light. Floors and woodwork offer some 
opportunity for picturesque effect. The former, in the districts where 
black walnut is abundant, may at trifling expense be laid with alternate 
strips of this and a lighter wood, pine or spruce. Eefuse walnut may 
be used, white sap not being a serious defect for this purpose. The floor 
should be laid without a border, which cannot, unless special prepara- 
tion is made for it, be nailed firmly enough for school-house wear. 

In a similar manner, doors and wainscot may have panels of one wood 
and framing of another. White wood (tulip or basswood) panels, in 
pine or spruce framing, look well ; if oiled, they quickly turn to a brown 
shade. Cap mouldings of wainscots may be dark wood and panels or 
other members may be painted, leaving the remaining parts natural or 
of a different color. Bronze green framing may have Indian red panels, 
or vice versa, and so on. All these things help to " dress up" a room, 
and though too violent for private dwellings they are not so for a school- 
house and do much to keep it looking bright and fresh without increas- 
ing its cost. 

Brick buildings need less exterior decoration ; massiveness is their 
proper quality, and whatever increases the impression of this helps the 
effect of the building. Reveals, that is, the sides of the window and door 
recesses, should be deep. For instance, in a 16-inch hollow wall it is 
possible either to put the window frame near the inside of the wall, 
leaving 12 inches of brick surface to form the outer part of the recess, 
or to set the frame only 4 inches back from the general wall surface, in 
which case there will be a considerable interior reveal, to be plastered 
or lined with wood. Of these two modes, the former has much the bet- 
ter appearance. 

With brick or stone walls a peculiarly picturesque and pleasant effect 

is given by using tiles for roof covering instead of slates or shingles. 

Those made at Akron, Ohio, by Merrill, Ewart & Co., have projecting 

lips, which much improve the tightness of the roof laid with them. 

328 



92 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

Without some such device ordinary tile roofs will admit dry, drifting 
snow, unless made of very steep pitch, but it is safe to use them where 
only rain is to be feared. 

It is very fashionable in England to paint the woodwork of brick build- 
ings — sashes and frames of windows, doors, and balustrades — white, and 
the effect is pleasant. The sash bars are made quite thick — seven-eighths 
of an inch, instead of the five- eighths usual with us — to avoid the spider 
web look of the lines, and small lights are used. In some cases the 
frames and sashes are even gilded, so there is no want of example for 
the exercise of fancy in decoration of this kind. Figs. 77, 78, and 79 
show different modes of treating the model plan. Fig. 80 shows a small 
English school-house recently built. 

SPECIFICATIONS AND CONTRACTS. 

It only remains to suggest models for specifications and contracts 
which shall be suitable for ordinary cases. To present a separate model 
for each kind of building, brick, stone, and wood, is unnecessary ; any 
one can make the requisite changes to suit a given specification to one 
or the other construction. What seems most essential is that the model 
shall include all that is needed for a particular building. Then, for a 
structure of the same kind, the specification can be adopted entire, with 
assurance that there is nothing omitted, and for one of a different 
sort the completeness of the model will help to call attention to all the 
points which need modification. 

In the same way, in regard to contracts, there is much less danger 
that an intelligent committee or superintendent will be unable to mod- 
ify a given form to adapt it to various circumstances than that, if the 
model before them is too general or incomplete, as such models usually 
are, they will not be able from their own experience to supply those 
numerous clauses and conditions for want of which serious trouble may 
afterward arise. 

It seems best, therefore, to give a full specification for an ordinary 
frame structure of the best and most thorough kind ; such a one as an 
architect desirous of saving his employers from bills of extras would 
think it necessary to use. Following this is a form of contract which, 
though much longer than the agreements that are frequently used, is 
as condensed as it can be without leaving out clauses which, though in 
nine cases out of ten needless, the tenth time become of great impor- 
tance. It is the essence of a good contract that it shall leave no con- 
tingency unprovided for. Long experience has shown that all the 
emergencies contemplated in this model are liable to occur, and it is for 
the benefit both of builder and owner to have their rights and duties in 
such cases defined beforehand, so that no apology is needed for the 
length of the document. It will rarely be necessary to call in a lawyer 
to draw up such papers, unless some very unusual stipulation is to be 
introduced. 

329 



-V—v ^ 



N 



3 



Face p 




Face page 92. 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCKITEC'I URE. 



93 




327 



94 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

MODEL FOR SPECIFICATIONS. 

Mason's specification for school-house to be built for the inhabitants of the 
town of X on their land on Y street. 

Excavation. — Excavate the cellar to a uniform depth of 3 J feet below 
the highest point of the ground which the building covers, making the 
excavation 8 inches wider all around than the outside of foundation 
walls, as marked on plan ; excavate trenches for all walls and piers 2 
feet below cellar bottom ; excavate trench 4 feet deep and 100 feet long 
for drain pipe ; and excavate for setting posts of porch 4 feet deep, and 
for cesspool as shown on plan. Separate the loam and stack by itself 
where directed, and dump the other earth from the excavations wher- 
ever directed within 200 feet of the building. Excavate for bulkhead 
to cellar. Kefill about cellar walls with gravel. Eefill around cesspool 
and posts. Level and grade neatly about the building as directed, and 
put the loam on top. Clear away and remove all rubbish and leave the 
ground in good order. 

Blasting. — If any blasting should be necessary for excavating the 
cellar as above specified, seven cents (more or less) per cubic foot wdl 
be allowed by the town for blasting and removing the stone, and all the 
stone so removed which may be suitable shall be used in building the 
cellar walls, and for all stone so taken from the cellar and used in the 
walls the town shall be credited at the rate of seven cents (more or less) 
per cubic foot. 

Drain-pipe. — Eurnish and lay in the best manner from cellar wall to 
cesspool 100 feet of first quality {Portland, Akron Scotch) 6-inch glazed 
earthenware drain pipe, to be jointed with clear fresh Portland cement 
and the joints scraped smooth inside as laid; all uniformly graded. 
Leave the line of pipes open until inspected and approved, then refill 
the trench with earth, the last 12 inches of filling to be loam. 

Foundations. — All the lime used in the mason work to be ~No. 1 extra 
Eockland, Bockport, or Thomaston (Canaan, Glen's Falls^ &c), and all 

cement to be fresh Eosendale (Akron, Louisville, Portland) of the 

brand. 

Walls. — Furnish all materials and build cellar wall as follows : Put 
first into the trenches 18 inches in depth of quarry chips or broken stone, 
dry, and upon this build the walls 18 inches thick in ledge stone laid 
in mortar made with lime and cement in equal parts and clean sharp 
sand in proper proportion; the wall to be well bonded, the joints filled 
with mortar, and the whole trowel pointed outside and inside the whole 
height. Set the best face of the stones outside, both above and below 
ground. Set footing stones for piers and chimneys. Build bulkhead 
walls of stone in cement mortar, neatly faced. Bed the sill of the 
building in cement mortar, and bed and point up around frames of base- 
ment windows. 

Cesspool. — Build a tight brick circular cesspool 5 feet inside diameter 

331 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



95 




330 



96 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

and 5 feet deep below spring of arch, the walls to be 8 inches thick, of 
hard brick in cement. Dome over the top 4 inches thick, and lay the 
bottom 4 inches thick, all of hard brick in cement. Leave manhole 20 
inches in diameter, and cover with. a 3-inch Milestone 2 feet square, with 
hole cut in the top and iron grating. Build in the overflow and inlet 
pipes. Carry overflow to small dry well. 

Brick-worJc : Piers. — Build {four) piers in cellar, 12 by 12 inches, to 
under side of girders, of hard brick in mortar made with equal parts of 
lime and cement. 

Chimneys. — Build chimneys, as shown on drawings, of hard brick in 
lime mortar to under side of roof boarding, above roof to be selected 
brick in mortar made with one part cement to two parts clean sharp 
sand (no lime), and the four upper courses to be laid in clear cement j 
all withs to be 4 inches thick, bonded into' the walls, and all flues 
carried up separately to the top. Plaster every flue inside, brushing 
the mortar smooth with a wet brush, and the outside of the chimney to 
under side of roof boarding. 

Provide and set iron thimbles and cover for stove pipe (furnace) and 
two 20 by 30 Creamer's ventilating registers, black japanned, with cords, 
&c, complete. 

Lay three courses of rough brick in mortar between the beams on top 
of sill. 

Plastering: Cellar ceiling. — Lath and plaster the cellar ceiling one 
coat, smoothed. 

Back plastering. — Back plaster the outside walls from sill to under side 
of plate, between the studs ; the laths to be nailed to vertical strips or 
laths put on the inside of the boarding. 

Two coat work. — Lath and plaster two coats in the best manner all 
other walls and ceilings except in woodshed, carrying the plaster to the 
floor everywhere. Laths to be seasoned pine or spruce, laid § inch open, 
and breaking joint every six courses and over all door and window 
heads. The first coat of plaster to be of extra (Rockland) lime and clean, 
washed, sharp sand, and well mixed with long hair. The lime is to be 
slaked separately at least seven days before mixing with the sand and 
hair. The first coat to be well trowelled, straightened with a straight 
edge, and made perfectly true, and brought well up to the grounds. 
The skim coat is to be made with extra (Rockland) lime, slaked at least 
seven days before mixing, and washed (beach) sand, and well floated. 

Point up with lime and hair mortar around window and door frames ; 
patch up and repair all the plastering at the completion of the building, 
and leave all perfect. 

Carpenter } s specifications, &c: Scantlings. — Sill 6 by 6 (creosoted by 
Hayford Wood Preserving Company), well painted on the under side- 
Plate, 4 by 4 ; corner posts, 4 by G ; window studs, 3 by 4 ; door studs, 
4 by 4 ; all other studding, 2 by 4 ; 16 inches on centres. Braces, 1£ by 
4, gained in on the outside of the studding. There will be one 6 by 10 
332 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 97 

girder through the middle of the building, and the floor beams will be 
all 2 by 8 (2 by 9), (2 by 10), 16 inches on centres, notched down 4 inches 
on the sill and 1 inch on the girder. Rafters 2 by 8 (2 by 9), (2 by 10), 20 
inches on centres, every pair of rafters to be tied at the foot with 1^-inch 
plank at least 8 inches wide. (If space is gained overhead by putting 
the ties part way up the rafters these must be 2 by 10 or 2 by 12.) Hip 
and valley rafters 2 by 12 (3 by 12), (3 by 14). All rafters to be notched 
on the plate and spiked. Bridge the floor with two rows of double her- 
ringbone crossbridging. 

Cornice. — Form cornice as shown on drawings, with gutter all around 
the building, and two (four) 3-inch patent expanding galvanized iron 
conductors where directed, with 2-inch lead goosenecks and quarter- 
turn at foot of each. Joints in gutters to be made tight with sheet lead. 

Hoofing. — Cover the roof with hemlock (spruce) (pine) boarding, planed 
one side to an even thickness, and two thicknesses of pine tarred ( Vir- 
ginia rosin sized) (asphalted, Beaver brand) felt paper. 

Shingles. — Shingle with good sawed pine (saived or shared cedar) [sawed 
shingles rot sooner, but hold paint better] shingles laid 4J inches to the 
weather and put on with two galvanized (Swedes iron) nails to each 
shingle. 

Roofing with slate. — Cover the roof with matched pine hoards, planed 
one side, two thicknesses pine tarred paper, and slate ivith best eastern 
(Peachhottom) (Chapman's) ( Vermont green) (red) slate not over 8 by 16, laid 
with 3 inches lap, and nailed with two galvanized (patent) nails to each slate. 

Flashings. — Cut channels in brick work of chimney and cement in 
wide flashings of 4-pound lead ; shingle in (slate in) wide zinc flashings 
in valleys, and warrant all tight for one year. ( Cover ridge of slate roof 
with 4-pound lead, and slate in wide flashings on hips.) 

Outside finish. — Make finish and outside ornamental work, porch, &c, 
all of clear, seasoned pine, according to detail drawings. 

Walls. — Inclose the walls with hemlock boards (pine or spruce) planed 
one side to an even thickness, and two thicknesses of good felt (cane 
fibre) paper, breaking joint, and cover with sap extra pine clapboards, 
4£ inches to the weather (edge sprung boards) (matched or rebated boards) 
(shingles), all nailed with galvanized nails to every stud. 

Casings, &c. — Casings and cornerboards 1^ inches (|) thick. The top 
of all casings to be rebated and the under side of window sills ploughed 
to receive clapboards or shingles. 

Porches. — Porches to stand on cedar (locust) (creosoted spruce) posts, 4 
feet in the ground. Floors framed with 2 by 8 beams, and covered with 
matched |-inch Georgia pine boards, well nailed and edge rounded. Fill 
in beneath with §-inch boards jig-sawed as per detail drawing. Eoof to 
have 2 by 4 rafters, with roofing as for main roofs, and ceiled underneath 
with ^-inch matched and beaded sheathing not over 4 inches wide, as 
shown on drawings. 

7 c i 333 



08 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1860. 

Outside steps. — Make outside steps with J-inch pine risers and l^-inck 
Georgia pine treads, with rounded nosings returned at the ends, all sup- 
ported on 2 by 12 inch strings, 12 inches on centres, the outer strings to 
be planed, and the foot of the strings to abut on a 1 by 4 piece, sup- 
ported by two cedar (locust, &c.) posts, 4 feet in the ground. Make 
bulkhead to cellar with plank steps on plank strings, and cover of 
matched boards, battened, hung, and made tight. 

Inside flooring. — Woodshed to have single floor of planed 2-inch plank. 
Other inside flooring to be double; under floor of planed hemlock 
(second quality pine or spruce) boards and upper floor of thoroughly 
seasoned and kiln dried first quality § matclied Georgia pine, not over 4 
inches wide, laid in courses, breaking joint every course, thoroughly 
strained, and well blind nailed to every beain ; all to be well smoothed 
and scrubbed at the completion of the building. Put felt paper between 
upper and under floor. (Single floor of 1^ matched Georgia pine.) 

Grounds and. furring. — Put on grounds for f -inch plastering and beads 
on all angles. Cross fur the ceiling with 1 by 2 strips, 12 inches on 
centres. 

Partitions. — Partitions to be set with 2 by 4 studs, 16 inches on cen- 
tres, well straightened before plastering, and bridged once with angular 
plank bridging. Truss partitions where required. 

Inside finish. — The inside finish to be all of first quality Indiana calico 
ash (Michigan ash, Eastern or own ash, oaTc, cherry, black walnut, pine, 
whitewood). 

Wainscot. — Make panelled wainscot around main and class rooms and 
vestibules, as shown on drawings, in long horizontal panels, 2 feet high 
under blackboards, 4 feet high elsewhere. Framing to be bevelled. Put 
cap with trough as shown under blackboards. 

Sheathing. — Sheathe dressing-rooms and lavatories 4 feet high with 
finch matched and beaded vertical ash sheathing, not over 4 inches 
wide, finished with neat bevelled cap. 

Put on wainscot and sheathing before the upper floor is laid, and allow 
£ inch extra below floor. 

Architraves. — All doors and windows to have £-inch by 4-inch plain 
board mitred architraves of ash, with bevelled edges. 

Stool caps. — The capping of wainscot will run in to form stool cap of 
windows. 

Doors. — Outside doors to be 6-panel as per detail drawings, If inches 
thick, of best seasoned clear pine, with bevelled framing, but no mould- 
ings. All other doors to be 1£ inches thick, 6-panelled, with flush mould- 
ings, all of seasoned pine (veneered with ash both sides). 

All doors to have rebated and beaded plank frames of ash, and hard 
wood (Georgia pine or cherry) thresholds (saddles), and all doors and 
finish to be of the best stock and kiln dried. 

Windoics. — Six cellar windows to have rebated plank frames and 1A- 
inch pine sash hinged at top, with hook and staple to keep it open, and 

334 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 99 

iron button fastening. Make in addition two frames without sash for 
cold air box to furnace, and cover with strong wire netting. ' 

All other windows to have boxed frames with pockets, hard pine or 
cherry beads and pulley styles, 2-inch sills pitching 1J inches, lf-inch 
clear pine sashes in lights as shown, all double hung with good pulleys 
with cap over the top and galvanized face, best unbleached hemp cord 
and iron weights, accurately balanced. Inside beads of ash, put on with 
blued screws. 

Wardrobes. — Fit up wardrobes with shelves, hooks on strips, shoe 
boxes, &c, as directed. Fit up washbowl in each, without cupboard 
beneath. Fit up water closets with whitewood (tulip or bass icood) seats 
to be hung with brass butts and screws and riser screwed on. Plough 
the sheathing into top of seat. Make earth boxes and apparatus com- 
plete as directed. 

Miscellaneous. — Make cold air boxes as directed ; cut holes for regis- 
ters, and cut as required for plumbers and furnace men. Assist the 
other workmen. Make coal bins in woodshed. [Cold air boxes are- best 
made of galvanized iron.] 

Hardware. — All doors to be hung with 4 by 4 japanned acorn fast 
joint butts, put on with blued screws. 

Outside doors to have brass face mortise lever locks; inside doors 
bronzed iron face, good common locks, all with plated or German silver 
keys (Gorbin or Nashua Lode Company's make?), and best lava knobs. 

Water closet doors to have neat japanned barrel bolt in addition to 
lock. 

Windows to have spring sash fasts, to cost $2 per dozen. 

Hooks in wardrobes to be in two rows, 8 inches apart in each row, to 
be japanned cast iron, very stout. Heavy bulkhead doors with strong- 
strap hinges, with staple and padlock fastening. 

Painting: Outside. — Paint the roofs two coats best English Venetian 
red (Rocky Mountain vermilion. Iron clad, Rossie) paint in pure linseed oil 
(slate paint, light or dark). Paint all other outside woodwork two coats 
in tints as directed, touched with red as directed, using best pure lead 
and linseed oil. Paint sashes three coats, to finish bronze green (white). 
Oil two coats all hard wood floors and outside steps. 

Inside. — Fill ash doors and interior wood work with wax and turpen- 
tine, or patent filler, and finish with two coats of shellac well rubbed 
down with emery cloth and oil. Puttystop after first coat; clean off all 
stains and leave all perfect. 

Glazing. — Glaze in the best manner in lights as shown all outside sashes 
with first quality double thick American or German glass, back-puttied ; 
clean off at the completion of the building, and leave all whole and 
perfect. 

The carpenter is to clean up the building, scrub the floors, clear away 
rubbish, and leave the building clean. 

335 



100 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 



MODEL CONTRACT. 

Contract for building, made this day of , in the year , by and 

between the inhabitants of the town of Medford, in the county of Harrison 
and State of Texas, acting by their agent, William Smith, the chairman 
of the school committee of said town, the same being thereto lawfully au- 
thorized, party of the first part, and Thompson & Jones, of said Medford, 
builders, party of the second part. 

The said party of the second part, for himself and each of his heirs, 
executors, administrators, and assigns, hereby covenants and agrees to 
and with the said party of the first part, his successors and legal rep- 
resentatives, for the consideration hereinafter mentioned, to make, erect, 
build, and finish a school-house for the said party of the first part on 
his land on Maple street in said Medford, including all the carpenter 
and mason work, excavation and grading, painting and glazing, but 
exclusive of furniture, and to furnish all the materials of every kind, 
labor, scaffolding, and cartage for the full completion of the said build- 
ing, exclusive of its furniture, such work and materials to be in strict 
accordance with the drawings and specifications made by Henry Pratt, 
architect, which said drawings and specifications are to be taken and 
deemed as part of this contract, 1 and including all things which, in the 
opinion of the said architect, may fairly be inferred from such plans and 
specifications to be intended without being actually specified, all the 
materials to be in sufficient quantity, and where the quality is not de- 
scribed in the specification to be of the best quality, and the workman- 
ship throughout to be of the best quality, and the whole to be executed 
in a good, substantial, and workmanlike manner, subject to the direc- 
tions from time to time and to the satisfaction of the architect (or super- 
intendent) and the whole to be completely finished and delivered on or 
before the fifth day of October next. 

And the said party of the first part hereby promises and agrees in 
consideration of the foregoing covenants being strictly kept and per- 
formed by the said party of the second part, to pay to the said party of 
the second part the sum of two thousand five hundred dollars in two 
several payments as follows: One thousand dollars ($1,000) when the 
outside work is all done and painted one coat and the sashes in ; and 
the balance thirty-three days 2 after the said building shall have been 
completely finished and delivered and accepted by the said party of the 
first part, unless some defect shall meanwhile have been discovered 

1 It is not necessary, though it is advisable, that the drawings and specifications 
should be signed ; all that is requisite is that they iriay be easily identified. 

2 Any other number of days, but in any case postponing the final payment till a 
few days after the expiration of the time within which mechanics' liens can be en- 
tered against the building. 
336 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 101 

therein ; provided that no payment shall be made except on the certifi- 
cate of the architect or some other person thereto authorized by the 
said i>arty of the first part that the work for which such payment is to 
be made is properly done and that the payment is due ; said certificate, 
however, not exempting the party of the second part from liability to 
make good any work so certified if it be afterward discovered to have 
been improperly done or not according to the plans or specifications 
either in workmanship or materials ; and provided, further, that prior 
to each payment by the party of the first part a satisfactory certificate 
shall have been obtained to the effect that the said building is, at the 
time when the payment is due, free from all mechanics' liens and other 
claims chargeable to the party of the second part. 

And it is hereby further agreed, by and between the said parties 
hereto, that the drawings and specifications are intended to cooperate 
so that any works shown on the drawings and not mentioned in the 
specification or vice versa are to be executed by the party of the second 
part the same as if they were mentioned in the specification and shown 
on the drawings, without extra charge. 

The said party of the first part or the said architect (superintendent), 
with the consent of the said party of the first part, shall be at liberty 
to order any variations from the drawings or specifications, either in 
adding thereto or diminishing therefrom or otherwise however ; and such 
variations shall not vitiate this contract, but the difference shall be 
added to or deducted from the amount of the contract, as the case may 
be, by a fair and reasonable valuation, and the architect {superintend- 
ent) shall have power to extend the time of completion on account of 
alterations or additions so ordered, such extension to be certified by 
him to the party of the first part at the time when such order for alter- 
ations or additions is given. Orders for changes which do not affect 
the cost of the work may be given by word of mouth, but no order 
which increases or diminishes the cost of the work or affects the time 
<of completion shall be valid unless given in writing. 

Neither the whole nor any part of this contract shall be sublet by the 
party of the second part without the written consent of the party of 
the first part. 

If the said party of the second part shall fail to complete the said 
works, including all variations, should such be made, at or before the 
time agreed upon, with such extension, if any, in the case of extra work 
as may have been made and certified by the architect (superintendent), 
then and in that case the said party of the second part shall forfeit and 
pay to the said party of the first part the sum of (two to fifteen) dollars 
for each and every day that the said works shall remain unfinished after 
that time, unless in the opinion of the architect (superintendent) such 
delay shall have been due to causes which could not have been reason- 
ably foreseen by the party of the second part or with reasonable care 

337 



102 CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR 1880. 

and diligence avoided, the same to be retained as liquidated damages 
out of any sums that may then be due or may thereafter become due to 
the said party of the second part on account of his work and materials 
under this contract. 

All materials shall become the property of the party of the first part 
as soon as they are delivered on the ground. 

If the said party of the second part shall become bankrupt or insol- 
vent or assign his property for the benefit of creditors, or become other- 
wise unable himself to carry on the work, or shall at any time for six 
days neglect to do so in the manner required by the architect (superin- 
tendent), or refuse to follow his directions as to the mode of doing the 
work, or shall neglect or refuse to comply with any of the articles of this 
agreement, then the said party of the first part or his agent shall have 
the right and is hereby empowered to enter upon and take possession of 
the premises after giving two days' notice in writing, and thereupon all 
claim of the said party of the second part, his executors, administrators, 
and assigns shall cease, and the said party of the first part or his agent 
may, after using such other materials already on the ground as may be 
suitable, provide other materials and workmen sufficient to finish the 
said building, and the cost of such work and materials shall be deducted 
from the amount to be paid under this contract. 

The party of the second part shall be solely responsible for all loss or 
damage to the said works or any part of them until the whole is deliv- 
ered and accepted, loss by fire alone excepted ; he shall keep his interest 
in the building at all times insured to an amount not less than fifteen 
hundred dollars ($1,500), aud shall, if required, deposit the policy with 
the architect (superintendent) for approval and safe keeping, and shall 
give all necessary assistance to the other workmen employed in the 
building, and shall be solely responsible for all damage or delay 
caused to their work or materials or to neighboring property or to the 
persons or property of the public by his workmen or through his opera- 
tions. 1 

And the said party of the first part agrees to keep his interest in the 
building insured against fire to an amount equal to that of the pay- 
ments made on this contract until the building is delivered and accepted. 

And for the faithful performance of each and every the articles and 
agreements hereinbefore contained the said parties hereto do hereby bind 
themselves, their heirs, executors,, successors, administrators, and as- 
signs, each to the other in the penal sum of one thousand dollars ($1,000) 
(about one-third of the contract price) firmly by these presents. 



1 It saA r es trouble to have the party of the first part insure the whole risk, payable 
to him ' • for whom it concerns." The builder, however, may not be willing to trust him 
to divide the money in case of loss, and should not' be compelled to do so ; but as a 
lire while the builder's interest was uninsured would perhaps bankrupt bin), causing 
expense and delay to both parties, he should be obliged to insure his interest himself 
if he is not disposed to trust the other party to do it for him. 
338 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 103 

In witness whereof the said parties hereto have hereuuto set their 
hands and seals the day and year first above written. 

THE TOWN OF MEDFOED, [seal.] 1 

In presence of— By WILLIAM SMITH, 

Charles Harris. Chairman of the School Committee. 

Emily Thompson. THOMPSON & JONES. [seal.] 2 



'The seal of the town must affixed. 

2 Itisbest, but not necessary, to have both partners sign. Each signature should 
be accompanied with a seal. 

339-340 



RURAL SCHOOL ARCHITECTURE. 



105 



APPENDIX. 1 



The wigwam is superseded by houses built of logs before sawmills are erected in a 
new country. Combining, as it does, not a few excellences, this style of building de- 
serves more consideration than it receives. There is no good reason why a well built 
log house should not be as comfortable as any other. Logs are non-conductors of heat. 
The sun does not " strike through them," as through a common hollow or any thin 
walled house. The timber can, in wooded regions, be had for the asking. The chop- 
ping, hauling, and construction involve more labor than the box-frame style of build- 
ing, but the "money out" is less. Where labor and timber are plenty and money 
scarce, let there be more pains taken in erecting the building ; then every advantage 
that is absolutely necessary may be gained. A good log house will last a generation. 




The main building is 34 by 30 feet, with a lean-to of eight feet, subdivided into a 
teacher's room and anterooms; pitch of roof, 17 feet; projection of eaves, 3 feet; height 
of ceiling, 13 feet. 

The construction of log houses is generally best understood by the frontiersmen who 
use them. The following hints may not be unacceptable to beginners : 

Select timber which will last well when exposed to the weather. The logs should 
be 10 to 12 inches in diameter. The sills might be heavier, say 16 inches, squared, 
hollowed at the ends and pinned, or, better, spiked with 60-penny nails. The flooi 
timbers are mortised with the sills and supported in centre by a bearing beam. The 

'From School Houses and Cottages for the People of the South, by C. Thurston 
Chase. 

8 C I 341 



106 



CIRCULARS OF INFORMATION FOR WHO. 



ceiling, joists, and rafters arc lighter, say 7 inches. After they are up the joists may 
be stayed to the rafters to prevent their settling. Still smaller sticks may be used for 
the partitions, say 4 or 5 inches in diameter. 

There are several ways of making the partitions. One is to lay the logs horizontally 
between two standards or upright posts at each end. Another is to plough out a 
groove in larger sticks, squared, say two inches deep. Set up one at each end of a 
partition, and for door posts. Hew down the ends of the stuff for partitions so they 
will fit nicely into the groove. This done, put them in their places. They should be 
smoothly payed on each side with stiff clay, or chinked iu the ordinary way. They 
may also be made of tongued and grooved inch and a quarter stuff, set upright, run 
into grooves in a head piece above and fixed by strips uailed each side at the bottom. 
Let the roof project far over the sides to shield them from the storms and hot sun. 

The ceiling may be covered with boards, battened, and the whole inside white- 
washed. It is better, however, to lath and plaster when lime, sand, and hair are ob- 
tainable. Then, with good furniture, the establishment may well challenge our pride. 
On such a house not over two hundred dollars in mone y need be expended to accom- 
modate 50 to 64 pupils. 

The finial (the ornament on the peak of the roof) should be made of some regularly 
branching sapling, the limbs trimmed to even lengths. 




Plan of log school-house for sixty pupils. Outside measurement, 34 by 30 feet. 



Description op Plan. 
Scale -^ inch to 1 foot. 



A. School room, 32 by 28 feet. 

B. Boys' anteroom, 8 by 7 feet. 

C. Girls' anteroom, 8 by 7 feet. 

D. Teacher's anteroom, 11 by 7 teet. 
Size of desks to be used, 3§- by 2 feet. 
Side aisles, 3-J feet. 

Centre aisle, 2-J- feet. 
Rear aisle, 4 feet. 
342 



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